God and Grandma

Written in London on August 5, 2009 during the Faiths Act Fellowship training:

My grandmother is an illiterate, Pakistani woman.  By illiterate I mean that the only thing she knows how to read is the Arabic script of The Qur’an and The Qur’an alone.  She has no idea what it means when she speaks it.  I grew up sharing a bedroom with her when she lived in Hinsdale and Westmont, Illinois with us.  From the fajr prayer (the pre-sunrise prayer) to the asr prayer (the mid-noon prayer), all of which she kept diligently, she would recite The Qur’an out loud.  I like to think a part of that was so the prayers entered my head, and that I would soon join her in prayer, which I rarely did and which I rarely now do.

My grandmother is sitting at my home in Westmont now, undoubtedly fingering her prayer beads, the thasbi, and bowing her head in prayer.  Not just for me, but for my very large family, and the world at large.  Although she is not the sole reason I am here, my grandmother embodies everything that is faith.  She does not understand the words that she speaks when she reads The Qur’an, but she reads them because they are Allah’s words, the words of the Almighty.  And they ground her regardless.  She has taught me what it means to be patient and understanding; her faith is not blind, it is wholesome.  She gave me that faith as the words of The Qur’an entered my head.  She continues to give me faith as I cross the oceans that now feel like mere ponds.  As I fully come to realize my potential.

I do this because of her, and for her.  Because she could not and I can.  Because she has moved me to see myself in terms of faith, and not in terms of anything else.  Because anything else would not have been enough.