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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]While we await the answers from our Muslim contributors who perhaps have access to non-common sources, here is what precious little is known about Muslim converts:

"How Many People Convert to Islam?" asks The Economist. http://www.economist.com/blogs/economist-explains/2013/09/economist-explains-17

And it answers:

"Calculating convert numbers is tricky. [b]The census in England and Wales does not ask people about their past religions. British mosques do not keep a central record of conversions. [/b]Some new believers keep their conversions secret, worried about the reactions of friends and family. But using census data on race and religion, and questionnaires issued to mosques, Kevin Brice, a researcher at the University of Wales Trinity Saint David, calculated that around 5,200 Britons turn to Islam every year, and that the total number of converts is about 100,000. [b]In America calculating conversion rates is even harder. The census does not ask about religion and few mosques keep registers of their members, so even the total number of American Muslims is uncertain, let alone that of converts. In 2007 the Pew Research Centre estimated that there were around 2.4m American Muslims; in 2000 President Bill Clinton made reference to a figure of 6m. Pew reckons that just under a quarter are converts, the majority of them African American[/b]. - See more at: http://www.economist.com/blogs/economist-explains/2013/09/economist-explains-17#sthash.ixukVELd.dpuf"

And this is from Pew, the cited 2007 study:

More than three-quarters (77%) of Muslim Americans say they have always been a Muslim, while 23% say they converted to Islam; 9-in-10 (91%) converts to Islam were born in the United States, and almost three-fifths (59%) of converts to Islam are African American.
http://www.pewresearch.org/daily-number/converts-to-islam/

On the African-American thing: there was at one point in the 80s and the 90s a strong, Saudi-financed dawa effort directed at African-Americans and woven with the distrust of the white man and the need to find an alternative religion.  An American convert Umar Lee wrote an intriguing series about this called The Rise and Fall of Salafi Dawa, the core message of which that the dawa effort taught blacks Islam but it taught them absolutely nothing by way of life skills required to lead a Muslim family life (how to hold a job, how to study, how to pay your bills, how to be married, how to be responsible for your family etc.) The interesting thing is that the Muslim discourse in the U.S. tends to be dominated by educated, wealthy Arabs and Pakistanis and rarely includes a point of view of American-born native Muslims - because they are usually dirt poor, living in the ghetto and not mixing with immigrants with Muslim countries.  There is a big community of them in Philly.  Many are in prisons.  Those usually run matrimonial ads in the back pages of Muslim Link (a newspaper here in DC) that read something like: "Looking for a sister for marriage, age and race unimportant, write to penitentiary # XXX".

In DC, there's a couple of raggedy mosques for this population in the Northeast. I have a rental property in Trinidad and I used to see them at street corners, so recognizable in their highwater pants and long beards, hanging out on the street in the middle of the day, but undoubtedly "on the deen", if you ask them.

But then again, there's Congressman Ellison and Kareem AbdulJabbar and Muhammad Ali. So not all ghetto.

And of course, white girls who want to marry Muslims. The devotion of this crowd usually depends on the stability of their marriages. [/quote]

Thanks for these links![/quote]

I will look for the evidence you seek regarding the numbers. Meanwhile, why devote so much to explaining that some percentage of Islam includes ghetto or African Americans? WTH? Why is the color of their skin or economic status noteworthy in discussing population numbers? Regardless of color of skin and economic status, they COUNT. Moreover, Islam does not care about the color of anyone's skin or economic status. People from France to African Americans are converting and in God's eyes their devotion is equal. Perhaps this is why so many African Americans do convert to Islam- they feel welcomed in Islam. However, what I described to you in previous pages was the face of the new Muslim. The new Muslim will be a blend of mixed races. And every successive generation will be more wealthy. Iranian Muslims, Arab Muslims, and Pakistan Muslims that are first generation are fairly wealthy and well educated. This pattern will continue. You would never recognize my kids as " Muslim" if you saw them. This is the new face of Islam. But the new generation is not losing their faith in the process of assimilation.

Soon there will be a Muslim on every block if not in every house. Everyone will know at least one Muslim. I am not trying to frighten you with this prediction; its simply the direction we are headed in. So its not wise to alienate such a large population by insults about our religion or references to people in our faith who live in ghetto's...[/quote]

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