When I thought all was lost...

We have so much work to do. I chose Islam for the wonder of the word, because I believe in the five pillars of the faith, because I love Allah and justice.  I have been blessed to bear witness to women's realities in what people think of as two different worlds, and I have seen that those realities are essentially the same.

I bear witness to the woman beaten by her lover in the street outside my Brooklyn apartment - and to the woman tied to a Nigerian whipping post.  I bear witness to the woman forced to strip to survive in Atlanta - and the woman forced to cover to survive in Afghanistan.  I bear witness to the ever increasing legions of women caught in this country's prison industrial complex, often because of the associations with husbands and male lovers - and I bear witness to women struggling against interpretations of the Shariah in Islamic courtrooms.  How do we measure a veiled woman's pain?  Does it weigh more or less than the trauma in an American woman's eyes?  Should we compare and contrast the horror, brutality, and hard smack against a woman's cheek?

I simply ask that we warrior women, Muslim and non-Muslim, stand shoulder to shoulder, forming ranks, bending forward to carry all our sisters, Muslim and non-Muslim, tapping our collective strength.

--Eisa Nefertari Ulen
   Excerpt from "Tapping Our Strength"

Mash'Allah