(October 2, 2016 at 5:27 am)paulpablo Wrote: What was your upbringing like? What did your parents or teachers tell you about homosexuals, sex education, women and so on? Were you ever hit?
My parents never taught me about homosexuals nor sex education. A little bit about women, but not too much. Maybe they felt that these topics were not relevant or important for me to know at a young age. But I learned about them later anyways.
Was I ever hit? Yes, but it wasn't frequent thing. I think the hardest one resulted in the formation of a small bump on one side of my face, and I went to school like that the next day. Another time I felt a brief 'ringing' sound in my ears.
(October 2, 2016 at 5:27 am)paulpablo Wrote: Do you ever have doubts about all this? Any doubts about God talking to some dust to get it to be alive, the stars being missiles to fight off devils, god telling people to write books and angels in general.
Around my high school years, yeah, I doubted, even to the point of becoming an atheist. But not anymore. I don't doubt my religion anymore.
(October 2, 2016 at 5:27 am)paulpablo Wrote: Do you at least objectively see SOME similarities between other religious cults and Islam. The messenger gives himself higher importance than his followers and different rules to follow. The way cults tend to expand, and split, and expand some more, and fight and so on.
If you look at Islam only from a historical point of view, then yes, of course you will find some some similarities between Islam and other religious cults. But I am not fixated on the historical part. I also read and study the message of the religion, what it is telling me, and I think about the things that the human heart yearns for in this chaotic world.
(October 2, 2016 at 6:14 am)robvalue Wrote: Why do you choose to be a Muslim?
I don't think it's really by "choice" that I am a Muslim. Rather, I believe that God alone has guided me to Islam.
Yes, maybe some of my conviction in Islam being the true religion came as result of my own study and my own reflection (and I do study and ponder a lot), but ultimately, the guidance and my ability to think and reflect came from God. So, it is obligated on me that I be thankful to Him at least.
