Belgian Convert (click "Read more" for translation)

Ali Recites S. Ikhlas

My name is Renault. I am 37 years old. I am Belgian. I come from Provence.

For some years I have lived in Brussels. I came for my studies, and then my work. For the last five years I have also been called Ali, because I converted to Islam.

I had visited Senegal, and I watched how the people looked, and how they acted, their way of life.

I spent time meditating, because I think one should always be in reflection about the world around you.

When I was 15, after having been educated in Catholicism, (I was kind of an anarchist?), I had “neither God nor master,” and then now, One Master only. Because I discovered in Islam a real and deep spirituality, and all I had been able to understand until that time, after watching the media;

For me Islam is tolerance. It is not intolerance, it is tolerance.

It is unity. It is for all people. It is not only for one group of people.

… before I knew some Muslims, I had some Muslim friends … but nothing prepared me for Islam… I think actually we are all of us Muslims, but it is at the moment of recollection that the fact of our being Muslim produces itself.

All I hope is insha`Allah that people ask good questions, for building a good discussion. I hope that [this discussion] will reduce ignorance, and will try to bring light, and Islam is clear.

Ali Reciting Qur`an, al-Fatiha.