Well, you don't run into many converts from Islam to Orthodoxy, but every now and then you do--especially if you can read Russian (which I can't). It seems like the Russian Orthodox Church is one of the very few Orthodox Churches that welcome in Muslims on a regular basis, good for them!
Here is the beginning of part of one convert's testimony (in English):
Do you remember, in 1984, five years after the Islamic Revolution, I was still a teenager, I met with a friend Ferdowsi Square in Tehran? I had come too early, and to kill time I decided to sit in the cinema and watch a movie... This film was "Jesus, son of Mary" - a stripped down version of the censored "Jesus of Nazareth" by Franco Zeffirelli!
Remember how I forgot about the whole world, absorbed in Thee, in spite
of the fact that the authorities deliberately mutilated the tape?
Remember how there, in Iran, I would like to go to church, and how the
spiritual fire kindled my heart at the sight of thy temple?
Remember in 1989 the first time I dared to cross the threshold of
the church - Catholic, in the heart of Karachi - and how disappointed
I was not finding you there? I did not know that you are in His infinite love to keep me this grace, which makes thy truth, the Orthodox Church.
Read it all here (in English): Pravmir.
And I don't think I have any Russian-language readers, but what the heck. Here is the segment in Russian:
Помнишь, как билось у меня сердце, когда я встречал Твое имя в
персидских стихах? Хафиз[1] и Руми упоминают о множестве людей, но лишь
при Твоем дивном Имени, Иисусе, душа моя трепетала от неведомой радости.
Пусть тогда я не знал Тебя умом, пусть кривое зеркало исламской
мистической литературы изображало Тебя обычным человеком, мое сердце
различило в Тебе красоту, много выше человеческой. Было ли то наитие
Святого Духа, или Твой образ во мне, поврежденный, но не уничтоженный,
узнал свой прообраз, когда я увидел Твое благодатное имя? Или, может
быть, сердце, намного опередив разум, узнало в Тебе своего Создателя?
Знаю только, что я ликовал, видя Твое благословенное имя.
What do you think? How does this Orthodox testimony compare to others who became evangelicals?
