It’s difficult to find a space that is woman-positive, queer friendly… and Muslim. If you ask me, I would say it is almost impossible! I’m a 20-something, far away from my hometown in New Brunswick, far from most of my family members, and my group of friends has changed drastically post university. We all graduated, and some moved away, moved on or changed. I will be the first to admit that, myself, have changed a lot since university and finding my faith was a big part of that change. Finding a support system of friends has been rather difficult because … Continue reading The Social Muslim

I’ve heard (and asked) this question many time: You drink, you have sex but you won’t eat pork? Post-9/11, our knowledge of Islam has “expanded” and most of us (North Americaners) are now aware that alcohol, premarital sex and swine are all forbidden in Islam just like in some other faiths. And like in other faiths, some Muslims sometime cheat. However, more often than not, at least with the Muslims I have encountered, they will often drink alcohol or have premarital sex but will still refrain from eating pork; something that baffles most of us who have delected in the … Continue reading You drink, you have sex but you won’t eat pork?

“It’ll come in due time.” My mother used to love to tell me this. I was an impatient child and wanted everything right away: from rewards to answers and everything in between, I wanted everything then and there. One fall, I was snooping inside my mother’s closet and found a puzzle, still wrapped in plastic. I brought it to my mom and asked “Is this for me?” Of course it was. “Can I play with it?” -This was meant to be your Christmas present, you can open it and play with it, but that is still your Christmas present! It … Continue reading The Now, the Present and the Afterlife

Over the years, I have come to build a relationship with not only God, but also with Catholicism. My mother being as practicing as she was and adamant about learning about Catholicism, I managed to learn a lot have grew close to my religion. However, as a child, I questioned my religion (never my faith) on topics such as homosexuality, the worship of Jesus as a “2nd God”, priests’ unability to marry and the hierarchy of the church. In my late teenage years, I abandonned religion almost entirely, appalled by those discrepencies between the message of God and the interpretation … Continue reading Losin’ my religion…

When I first started learning about Islam, I expected there would be no community of Muslims that would welcoming me and my strange background partly in the Queer community, partly as a small-towner from a French Acadian Catholic community. Oddly enough, I was able to find Muslims for Progressive Values: a group of like-minded Muslims and non-Muslims welcoming of one and all or so I thought. I find myself drifting away from that community, now that I find they are much more activists than I was looking for in a religious community. I also find myself longing, for the first … Continue reading God and community

I learned a little while back, the respect Muslims held for their holy book, The Noble Qu’ran. No one would dare putting the Qu’ran on the ground or even under a pile of books. They often position their Qu’ran on the top of their library, some even place them on its on tablet. Now THAT is respect! My books don’t get much respect. After four years of university studies, they basically are gathering dust wherever space can still be found. So when I decided to acquire a Quran, I was warned that it shouldn’t just go in one of my … Continue reading A Qu’ran on the Highest Shelf