Written by Vanessa Rivera Abusaker, 2011
I am a Puerto Rican living in New York. I relocated to New York on July 2, 2006 from San Sebastian, Puerto Rico. My town is in the mountains, North West of Puerto Rico. I learned about Islam for the first time when I was in the ninth grade, and I thought it was a very beautiful social movement. Then again, I heard about the Muslims as being guilty for the terrorist attacks on 9-11 to the Twin Towers, in NYC. That experience made me feel very prejudiced against this religion.
Then I met my husband to be in December of 2006, I expressed to him my bias, he didn’t condemn it, criticize or expressed any anger, on the other hand he remained calm, and went on to explain what was Islam, his character impressed me and started to make me curious about this misunderstood religion, therefore I started my search about the truth on Islam. We were married prior to my reversion to Islam for six months. During those six months I observed a very different kind of man. I was blessed to observe a man of honor and character who made the world stop when the time came for salat (muslim prayer). He and his friends are men that would stop at nothing to please their Lord. I wanted to praise my Lord, also. I thought to myself if we die right now he goes to heaven and I go to hell.
We had declared shahada (muslim declaration of faith) in the privacy of my home in the summer of 2007. After studying Islam for three years I decided that I needed to say my shahada publicly, being this my public commitment to become a permanent member of the Islamic congregation, therefore last year, my daughter(11 years old) and I declared our shahada at the mosque on 96 St in New York, New York. I researched a lot online about Islam and nowadays I attend classes regularly at the North Hudson Islamic Center in Union City, NJ.
This summer I decided to take my investigation to the field and learn about what brings Puerto Ricans that live in the island to Islam. I found out that statistics show that by the year 2007 there were about 5,000 Muslims living in Puerto Rico. Most of these Muslims were Palestinians who started arriving to Puerto Rico between 1958-1962, when many fled the country in response to the Armistice in Israel, after in 1949 Israel gained about 50% more territory than was originally allotted to it by the United Nations Partition Plan.
As a representative for Hablamos Islam Niños, and armed with great expectations, curiosity, and the desire to learn more about my faith in my island, I embarked in this great adventure of learning about Islam in Puerto Rico. My mission was not only to learn, but also to find children that could be recipient of the books donated by brothers and sisters through Hablamos Islam Niños. The tough part was to find children in the mosques because apparently people travel some distance to go to the mosque in the West of Puerto Rico, so they rather leave the children at home during jumu’ah. A brother named Maruan, a Palestinian business man (manager of the Grand Store in San Sebastian, Puerto Rico) residing in San Sebastian, Puerto Rico and father of two volunteered to distribute the books, as he has friends who are raising their children of Palestinian descent in Puerto Rico and also knows Puerto Rican convert families.
My visit to the mosque in Hatillo, Puerto Rico was very pleasant because I met some of the warmest members of the Islamic community in Puerto Rico. This center is located in the intersection of Hwy 22 and Hwy 2 in Hatillo, Puerto Rico. I was able to interact with the community there and listen to some of the most wonderful stories of reversion to Islam. I met Br Inocencio Rivera who reverted to Islam one year ago. He expressed: “As a teacher in Berkeley, Boston I became interested in the history of the Arabic culture, and our heritage as Moor’s descendants that inhabited Spain for more than 700 years.”
The most outstanding trait of Islam is the variety of cultures that come together as one ummah, sitting next to Br Inocencio was Br Najah Ismaili from Lebanon who’s been living in the island for nine years. Afterwards, I had the opportunity of meeting Sheikh Ismail, the imam. I was very impressed with his control of the Spanish language. The sheikh’s reaction was: “I lived in Venezuela for many years before relocating to Puerto Rico.” Sheikh Ismail delivers the khutbah in Arabic and Spanish. I asked him what was his impression of Islam in Puerto Rico.
The sheikh explained: “The muslim community in Puerto Rico is dispersed, I travel from Aguada to Hatillo, to come serve at this mosque, this is the closest to my town. The community of Muslims in Puerto Rico is mostly composed of Palestinians but there are more Puerto Rican reverts in the mosques in Montehiedra and Vega Alta. There are between twelve to fifteen active members that come to jumu’ah every Friday, to this mosque. With the help of our ummah we recently finished this mosque as you can see it is newly built. The members of this mosque are mostly from Palestine and Lebanon, but there are also some Puerto Rican reverts that attend this mosque.”
I am a Puerto Rican living in New York. I relocated to New York on July 2, 2006 from San Sebastian, Puerto Rico. My town is in the mountains, North West of Puerto Rico. I learned about Islam for the first time when I was in the ninth grade, and I thought it was a very beautiful social movement. Then again, I heard about the Muslims as being guilty for the terrorist attacks on 9-11 to the Twin Towers, in NYC. That experience made me feel very prejudiced against this religion.
Then I met my husband to be in December of 2006, I expressed to him my bias, he didn’t condemn it, criticize or expressed any anger, on the other hand he remained calm, and went on to explain what was Islam, his character impressed me and started to make me curious about this misunderstood religion, therefore I started my search about the truth on Islam. We were married prior to my reversion to Islam for six months. During those six months I observed a very different kind of man. I was blessed to observe a man of honor and character who made the world stop when the time came for salat (muslim prayer). He and his friends are men that would stop at nothing to please their Lord. I wanted to praise my Lord, also. I thought to myself if we die right now he goes to heaven and I go to hell.
We had declared shahada (muslim declaration of faith) in the privacy of my home in the summer of 2007. After studying Islam for three years I decided that I needed to say my shahada publicly, being this my public commitment to become a permanent member of the Islamic congregation, therefore last year, my daughter(11 years old) and I declared our shahada at the mosque on 96 St in New York, New York. I researched a lot online about Islam and nowadays I attend classes regularly at the North Hudson Islamic Center in Union City, NJ.
This summer I decided to take my investigation to the field and learn about what brings Puerto Ricans that live in the island to Islam. I found out that statistics show that by the year 2007 there were about 5,000 Muslims living in Puerto Rico. Most of these Muslims were Palestinians who started arriving to Puerto Rico between 1958-1962, when many fled the country in response to the Armistice in Israel, after in 1949 Israel gained about 50% more territory than was originally allotted to it by the United Nations Partition Plan.
As a representative for Hablamos Islam Niños, and armed with great expectations, curiosity, and the desire to learn more about my faith in my island, I embarked in this great adventure of learning about Islam in Puerto Rico. My mission was not only to learn, but also to find children that could be recipient of the books donated by brothers and sisters through Hablamos Islam Niños. The tough part was to find children in the mosques because apparently people travel some distance to go to the mosque in the West of Puerto Rico, so they rather leave the children at home during jumu’ah. A brother named Maruan, a Palestinian business man (manager of the Grand Store in San Sebastian, Puerto Rico) residing in San Sebastian, Puerto Rico and father of two volunteered to distribute the books, as he has friends who are raising their children of Palestinian descent in Puerto Rico and also knows Puerto Rican convert families.
My visit to the mosque in Hatillo, Puerto Rico was very pleasant because I met some of the warmest members of the Islamic community in Puerto Rico. This center is located in the intersection of Hwy 22 and Hwy 2 in Hatillo, Puerto Rico. I was able to interact with the community there and listen to some of the most wonderful stories of reversion to Islam. I met Br Inocencio Rivera who reverted to Islam one year ago. He expressed: “As a teacher in Berkeley, Boston I became interested in the history of the Arabic culture, and our heritage as Moor’s descendants that inhabited Spain for more than 700 years.”
The most outstanding trait of Islam is the variety of cultures that come together as one ummah, sitting next to Br Inocencio was Br Najah Ismaili from Lebanon who’s been living in the island for nine years. Afterwards, I had the opportunity of meeting Sheikh Ismail, the imam. I was very impressed with his control of the Spanish language. The sheikh’s reaction was: “I lived in Venezuela for many years before relocating to Puerto Rico.” Sheikh Ismail delivers the khutbah in Arabic and Spanish. I asked him what was his impression of Islam in Puerto Rico.
The sheikh explained: “The muslim community in Puerto Rico is dispersed, I travel from Aguada to Hatillo, to come serve at this mosque, this is the closest to my town. The community of Muslims in Puerto Rico is mostly composed of Palestinians but there are more Puerto Rican reverts in the mosques in Montehiedra and Vega Alta. There are between twelve to fifteen active members that come to jumu’ah every Friday, to this mosque. With the help of our ummah we recently finished this mosque as you can see it is newly built. The members of this mosque are mostly from Palestine and Lebanon, but there are also some Puerto Rican reverts that attend this mosque.”
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