Good morning Message,

Good morning.

This is Nela. I’m so glad you decided to join me on Nela’s Nest dot blog. I want to ask you a question. If you’re here and you’re searching, if you’re searching for answers, if you’re searching for peace, if you’re searching for clarity after confusion. (0:33) When I see this question, are you carrying guilt and shame? You know, I spoke with a woman from a global organization. She works with ex-Muslims from all around the world, from Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia, Egypt.   I myself have listened to ex-Muslim stories from, you know, U.S. other places. And there’s one thing that keeps coming up in these conversations. And that is guilt and shame. (1:16) Guilt says that I have done something wrong. Shame says that I am something wrong. Both of these are very toxic to our spiritual and emotional health. Now, what happens to a lot of Muslims while they may have good intentions in trying their best to practice the religion of Islam? (1:45) They find that they don’t meet the mark. And not meeting the mark might be, you know, missing prayers or missing fast, for example, or not wearing hijab or maybe falling into something that is considered forbidden.(2:09) Whatever the case may be, what happens, the cycle of the guilt and shame is that the person feels guilty for not doing or for doing wrong. (2:24) That’s number one. Then number two, they have to conceal it.They can’t share it with their friend that, you know what? I don’t want to fast Ramadan tomorrow. I don’t feel like fasting. (2:38) Or can I just fast, you know, a week out of Ramadan or do I have to do the whole 30 days? Or, you know what, I never made up my fast.  I’m so bad. I’m such a bad Muslim, such a bad person. There’s something wrong with me. So I can easily go from guilt straight to shame by first convicting myself for not doing. (3:05) And then proclaiming that inside of myself, and all this is going on inside of my own heart and my own mind, proclaiming that there’s something wrong with me. (3:17) And that’s the shame.And then the longer I keep it secret and try to cover it up, like a lot of Muslim youth are doing, the deeper the guilt and the shame becomes. (3:38) And now the tragedy of that is that my perception of what God thinks of me is all distorted. There are Muslims who think that God doesn’t love them.(3:58) God has cursed them. God is punishing them. They don’t know if God forgives them.And this is very, very trying on a human soul. (4:15) And so this space here is meant to be a space of healing. And so in a space of healing, there are certain things that have to be rooted out, certain things that cannot be present.(4:32) One of them is guilt. Another one is shame. Another one is blame.. So how do you feel about your relationship with God? (4:48) Do you feel that you are valuable to him? Do you feel that he loves you? Do you feel that you are loved? Do you feel that you are supported? (4:56) Do you believe that you’re worthy of God’s love? What are your thoughts, feelings around your relationship with God? (5:11) So I want to challenge you this morning. If you’re willing, if you are willing to journal and write down, really what’s in your mind, really what’s in your heart. (5:27) Because I can almost guarantee you, someone else feels the same way. Sometimes we feel like we’re alone. Like I’m the only one who feels like this. (5:39) I’m the only one who’s struggling with this. But that’s a trick of the enemy to keep you isolated. And the more isolated you feel, the longer it might take for you to heal. (6:00) So this was just a short message this morning.I hope this will benefit you. And pretty soon I will hold a very confidential private Zoom meeting for us to get together. (6:16) And discuss these things.

Take care. Peace.

Nela