Forbidden Love

 

  

 

Forbidden Love

I have spent my life thinking about religion and if religion can define people as good Samaritans. I wonder if a good person is good because they follow the practices of their religion or is it about their parents fostering and upbringing. I grew up in a Muslim family and this experience changed my point of view in life about everything. My realization has helped me to define the real meaning of religion. However, some people are born to adapt to the beliefs of their religion, and some people realize religion as they grow up. One thing I have and will always cherish is that a good person doesn’t come from any religion. It is a personal choice, and it can vary from the several factors like culture, family dynamics, values, and traits that they experienced in life. Islamic Muslim law and marriage have affected my generations of my family.

In Islam, it is prohibited that a Muslim women marry a person from different religion. It was stated in the surah verse of Quran. However, my mother chose her heart over her religion. My mother came from a religious Muslim family, and my father is Christian. They got married in 1962 in the Philippines. The family conflicts began after the marriage of my parents because of two different religious values and family opinions. It was the first time in the family of my grandparent’s that a child married someone from a different religion, and because of that, my mother got rejected from her family. The decision that she made affected her family in many ways.

In addition, my mother’s marriage has brought resentment all her life. My grandparents ignored her for so many years. She asked for forgiveness several times, but instead they refused to forgive her, and she felt bad and worthless. There was a time when my sister got sick, and my mother went to my grandparents to ask for help. However, they refused her first and the only reason they helped her because my sister was almost dying. I saw how my mother’s family treated her. They belittled her because she married outside religion and because my father was poor. Despite all her struggles, she stood for herself even though they didn’t treat her fairly but still she respects her parents.

Even though along with difficulties, my siblings and I went to a Catholic school. During primary school, I experienced the religious bewilderment. I didn’t have an idea which religion I was supposed to choose. In fact, every year I changed my religion. One of my teachers asked me which religion I was going to embrace if it is Islam or Christian because I couldn’t change my religion every year. I was confused which religion I should follow because my parents didn’t even discuss it with my siblings and me. The only thing I remembered was that my parents told me were free to choose which religion were going to embrace. One day, I finally had the answer. It took twenty-three years of my life for me to decide to be a Muslim.

As the time goes by, my own sense of religion and place in the world became different. I became aloof my entire life. I preferred to distance myself from anybody to avoid drama. Due to that experience, I had gone through all my life I have ended up quietly in the corner without engaging conversations to my relatives. There was a time I asked my mother if she had any regrets marrying my father because of the Islamic law of marriage. However, I realized why should I ask her a dumb question if from the start she chose her heart over her religion.

The conflicts between my mother’s and father’s families lasted for too long. My family left the conflicts as history and have learned from it. Religion can never define a person. The parents are the one who teach the children to be a good person, to respect others and especially to know God. Parents are the people who are going to shape and foster the children to be the best version of themselves. Being Muslim and Christian runs in my blood, and it doesn’t bother me at all. One thing I am proud of is how my parents did an amazing job raising me and my siblings. My siblings and I are grateful for having them to be our parents and I am thankful for the heartache and pain that I experienced because that has made me a stronger person after all.