Subject: Islamic Britain lures top people (Times London)
SUNDAY TIMES LONDON
February 22, 2004
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2087-1010553,00.html
“Islamic Britain lures top people”
NICHOLAS HELLEN AND CHRISTOPHER MORGAN
MORE than 14,000 white Britons have converted to Islam after becoming
disillusioned with western values, according to the first authoritative
study of the phenomenon. Some of Britain’s top landowners, celebrities and
the offspring of senior Establishment figures have embraced the strict
tenets of the Muslim faith.
The trend is being encouraged by Muslim leaders who are convinced that the
conversion of prominent society figures will help protect a community
stigmatised by terrorism and fundamentalism. Zaki Badawi, chairman of the
Imams and Mosques Council, said: “The community has been unfairly targeted
and these developments encourage it in a time of difficulty.” Meanwhile,
the Muslim Council of Britain has co-opted Joe Ahmed-Dobson, son of Frank
Dobson, the former health secretary, to chair its regeneration committee.
The new study by Yahya (formerly Jonathan) Birt, son of Lord Birt, former
director-general of the BBC, provides the first reliable data on the
sensitive subject of the movement of Christians into Islam. He uses a
breakdown of the latest census figures to conclude that there are now
14,200 white converts in Britain.
Speaking publicly for the first time about his faith this weekend, Birt,
whose doctorate at Oxford University is on young British Muslims, argued
that an inspirational figure, similar to the American convert Malcolm X
for Afro-Caribbeans, would first have to emerge if the next stage, a mass
conversion among white Britons, were to happen.
“You need great transitional figures to translate something alien (like
Islam) into the vernacular,” he said. “The image of Islam projected by
political Islamic movements is not very attractive.”
Initially, Birt said, he had no coherent reasons for converting, but: “In
the longer term I think it was the overall profundity, balance and
coherence and spirituality of the Muslim way of life which convinced me.”
The faith has made inroads into the Establishment. It emerged this weekend
that the great-granddaughter of a British prime minister has converted.
Emma Clark, whose ancestor, the Liberal prime minister Herbert Asquith,
took Britain into the first world war, said: “We’re all the rage, I hope
it’s not a passing fashion.” Clark, who helped design an Islamic garden
for the Prince of Wales at Highgrove, his Gloucestershire home, is now
helping create a similar garden for a mosque in Woking, Surrey, on the
site of a car park.
Many converts have been inspired by the writings of Charles Le Gai Eaton,
a former Foreign Office diplomat. Eaton, author of Islam and the Destiny
of Man, said: “I have received letters from people who are put off by the
wishy-washy standards of contemporary Christianity and they are looking
for a religion which does not compromise too much with the modern world.”
Others have come to Islam through love or marriage. Kristiane Backer, a
former girlfriend of the cricketer Imran Khan, said she was introduced to
the religion through love but converted after her break-up. She has shrunk
from speaking publicly about her religion before because of fears it might
affect her work prospects. “Imran sowed the seeds, but when (the
relationship) finished (the faith) took on a momentum of its own,” she
said.
Backer, who is drawn to Sufi mysticism, said white converts had to
overcome prejudice both from those born into Islam and from non-believers.
“In the mosque women come up and say to me, ‘You have hair showing: you
must cover up completely.’ I say, ‘Mind your own hair, you’re here to
think about God’.” She has ditched the revealing wardrobe she had as an
MTV presenter, but, equally, will not wear headscarves about town. “I
don’t show any legs or cleavage, or at least not together,” she said.
Some prominent converts are even more wary. The Earl of Yarborough, 40,
who owns a 28,000-acre estate in Lincolnshire, declined to discuss
anything about his faith. “I have nothing to say to you,” said Yarborough,
who has apparently taken the name Abdul Mateen.
Muslim leaders are harnessing modern campaigning methods to promote their
faith. Groups have sprung up on the internet publishing “trophy lists” of
white converts. The state-funded school in London founded by Yusuf Islam,
formerly the singer Cat Stevens, has turned to Premiership footballers to
provide role models. Sources close to the school say converts including
Nicolas Anelka, the Manchester City striker, and Omer “Freddie” Kanoute,
of Tottenham Hotspur, have made visits.
Fresh evidence came this weekend that Islam has received formal acceptance
at the heart of the Establishment. The Queen has approved new arrangements
to allow Muslim staff at Buckingham Palace time off to attend Friday
prayers at a mosque: a member of staff in the finance department is the
first to take advantage of it.