Posted on 04/24/2011 8:28:27 PM PDT by george76
Over a hundred members of the recently banned Millata Abraham Muslim sect on Friday underwent a mass conversion to mainstream faith at the Baiturrahman Raya Mosque in Banda Aceh.
The sect’s leader, Zainuddin, said the idea to convert came to him in a dream on April 19 that he had while locked away in a jail cell. He is facing a five-year sentence for blasphemy stemming from his practice of the banned religion.
The mass conversion comes in the wake of pronounced relgious hostility in the province. On April 6, Irwandi issued a gubernatorial decree banning the Millata Abraham, along with 13 other sects, from conducting religious activities in the province. The decree carries a maximum five-year jail term for those caught practicing.
A day after Irwandi issued his decree, thousands of Muslim teachers and students took to the streets of the capital to call on the governor to dismantle the sect for insulting Islam. The sect has also been declared haram, or forbidden, by the MPU.
Millata Abraham’s devotees do not recognize the Prophet Muhammad and only pray once a day at midnight, instead of five times a day as mainstream Muslims are required. Before the mass conversion, the faith, which began in 2007, said it had about 700 members.
On Friday, before being taken to the historic mosque to be converted, the sect members were individually photographed by police and had their personal histories written down.
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There has been speculation the converts in Bogor were pressured into renouncing their faith.
(Excerpt) Read more at thejakartaglobe.com ...
These dangerous rodents couldn’t possibly be faking it could they?
I wouldn’t be so generous as to call changing from one Moslem sect to another a “conversion”.
More like just changing seats on Flight 93.
I think whats going on here is -
New sect that is LESS nasty than standard Islam has been crushed by the Islamic powers that be in Aceh, a notably fundamentalist place. The chief of the sect is jailed on some charge and he is pressured to shut it down, after he is made to know what is good for him.
There are lots of more live-and-let-live Islamic sects, including the Ahmadis, which the article mentions as also being persecuted in Aceh. They certainly are persecuted in Pakistan.
This is Islam in action, maintaining the purity of the faith as is normal wherever they can get away with it. The only places where they can’t are where they aren’t in charge or its dangerous to do so if they have to deal with a critical mass of some other flavor of Islam.
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