¡Hola! The US’s Fastest Growing New Muslim Community
With about half of U.S. Muslims recent immigrants, rarely is it guessed what group makes up the fastest growing segment of our community today.
Latinos have shot from just 1% of America’s Muslims in 2001 to 8%, according to the latest studies.
U.S. Hispanic Muslims suddenly number a quarter million, making them a dynamic and appreciable part of the American Muslim scene. Given the unstoppable growth of America’s Latino population-19% of U.S. residents at 62.5 million in 2021, up from just 8% at 14.8 million in 1980-if demographics are truly destiny, the group’s turn towards Islam will have massive effects for the US Muslim community and the country as a whole.
The Future in the Past
The U.S. Latino journey to Islam began in the 70s with their exposure to Black and immigrant Muslim communities. Latino conversion grew steadily through the century’s close, then multiplied exponentially in the 2000s. A landmark moment occurred in 2001: Colombian convert Jamie Fletcher founded the Texas-based IslamInSpanish, the first Islamic organization catering to U.S. Spanish speakers. Now a massive nonprofit, it distributes Islamic resources across the Americas. Most critically, in 2016 IslamInSpanish established the first ever U.S. Spanish-speaking mosque in Houston.
Familiar conversion themes drive the Latino embrace of Islam-Islam’s pure and direct relationship with God, the peace and tranquility felt upon joining the faith, and the communal emphasis.
Latinos have also found affinity with Muslims based on feelings of social rejection and persecution, seeing Islam as an uplifting and dignifying recourse in America’s heavily increasing anti-Latino climate.
A fascinating attitude Latino Muslims express, similar to the Black American Muslim experience: Islam is no radical break from heritage but rather a return to native identity-the nearly millennia-long beautiful and powerful flowering of Islam in Spain, the celebrated golden era of Al-Andalus.
That’s the connection Giovanni, a young Chicago Latino, made after watching a historical depiction of Spanish Muslims, which eventually led him to Islam.
Chicago, a Natural Epicenter
Home to over 2 million Latinos and a committed core of Spanish-speaking Muslims, the City of Broad Shoulders seems destined to help power the establishment of U.S. Latino Muslims, just as it did its immigrant and Black Muslim populations.
Leading the charge in this frontier is Imam Christopher Abdulkareem Pavcilek, a convert at age 15 himself and deeply engaged in the Latino community for decades.
In 2018, along with a tight-knit group from the 1990s known as the Latino Muslims of Chicago, Abdulkareem saw the urgent need to formalize their mission to care for the growing Latino embrace of Islam in the city and to open the door for others.
“It was a way of securing myself in the faith, helping establish ‘us’ as a community, being part of that growth, and giving us a seat at the [American Muslim] table,” he said.
Ojala Foundation (pronounced Ohala) was born from this vision, taking its name from the Spanish verb I hope, derived from the Arabic insha’Allah, representing the merger of the aspirations of Latino culture and a return to Islam-a movement of hope in the refuge of Allah.
The Hope of Ojala
Ojala Foundation provides a plethora of Islamic Spanish resources, community programming aimed at Latino Muslims, and carries out humanitarian outreach missions in Chicago.
Ojala now sits on the cusp of meeting the urgent communal need of founding an Islamic Center focused on Spanish speakers, the first of its kind in the Midwest. Currently in the midst of a fevered fundraise to purchase a former church in Berwyn, near the western border of Chicago, one of the most densely populated Latino areas in the country and devoid of Islamic institutions as of now.
Founding a full-fledged Islamic Center, says Abdulkareem, will not only firmly root Chicago’s nascent Latino Muslim community but send out nurturing shoots for Muslim Latinos throughout the Midwest.
One Ummah, One Body
Imam Abdulkareem calls for the established Muslim community in Chicago and beyond to take an active role in the Latino Muslim journey, believing it to be a sacred duty and a positive gain for all involved parties.
A glance at the pages of history would support the Imam’s message. Throughout Islam’s story, Allah through his infinite wisdom has beautified and benefited His religion with different peoples, each bringing their own distinct flavor: Arabs their love of linguistics and recitation, the Persian dedication to the arts and sciences, Turks martial prowess, and the numerous other communities all woven together into an ornate tapestry known as the Ummah. Latinos, with their rich history and culture, would seem to be the latest people Allah has selected to thread into His blessed community.
Donate Now to Fund Renovations and be part of the next Latino Community!
