Converting One’s Religion in Lebanon
Samir (not his real name) a 45-year-old photographer, has converted from his original Druze religion only to become a Muslim Shiite. “I didn’t change because I was really a believer in the Muslim faith, I was just converting because I wanted to marry a Christian woman, and the Christians have tougher laws on divorce”. Samir said, while getting his camera ready to take pictures of a baptism. Samir did end up getting a divorce and counts his blessings he opted for Islam rather than Christianity.
In Lebanon, Article 9 of the Lebanese law permits its citizen to total religious freedom. The law also allows for any citizen to covert to any religion of his/her choice. But then again, Lebanon also operates its marriage, divorce, and custody laws based on the person’s religion’s law, rather than having a civil law that does all that. It is thus a very prevalent issue for the Lebanese to change their religion to suit their lifestyle needs.
Sheikh Wissam Al Mazouk, from the Sunni Higher court said the approximately 200–300 people convert to the Muslim Sunni religion, but this number is a general number of the conversion they have had through the years not just fixed to this year only.
Reasons for the conversion includes that they actually believe in the Islamic religion and have decided to convert to it, which Sheikh Al Mazouk continues on by saying that a very small portion of people do that. Other reasons would involve travelling to the Gulf, or maintaining their stay there which is a reason some Muslim Shiite decide to convert. The sole purpose of this conversion is due to the Gulf countries deporting Muslim Shiite’s therefore expelling them from their jobs, homes, and a life they have built in the Gulf. Also Sunni conversions would be from Christian men converting to marry a Muslim woman, as Muslim woman cannot marry a man outside the Islamic faith.
Christians who cannot divorce and who want to marry another woman also switch to become a Muslim Sunni. Sheikh Al Mazouk said that Christians willing to convert, cannot get divorced in the Sunni court because it does not have the authority to cancel the Church contact, a Christian man can however marry a second time. In some cases, in which a Shiite Muslim woman would want to marry a Saudi man she would convert to Sunni since the Saudi government would have a say in the marriage.
To become a Muslim Sunni, it would take a person about a year. Other than saying the Shahada the person has to take lessons on Islam and then is evaluated to see if he/she actually believes in the faith. If the person were a Shiite they would teach him the difference between the Sunni and the Shiite faith. In the end the person is given a certificate that s/he has officially become a Sunni and goes with two witnesses from the Sunni court to the Ministry of Justice and converts.
Sheikh Ahmad Kablan from the Shiite Higher court said that until December 4th of this year, 317 people have converted to the Shiite faith, to compare with last year where 380 have converted. Sheikh Kablan goes on to say that about 25% of these conversions are from foreigners who do indeed believe in the Islamic faith and choosing the Sect is usually based on the person that introduced to Islam. Much like Muslim Sunni conversions, where Christians convert so they can either marry a Muslim woman, or they cannot get divorced so they marry another time in the Shiite court. Some Sunni Muslims who have only daughters, convert to the Shiite faith so the daughters would receive the inheritance from their parents since the Sunni faith allocates the inheritance to the male relatives. A famous example of such a conversion would be the Lebanese first Sunni Prime Minister, Riad El Solh who became a Shiite to make sure his five daughters would be able to inherit him.
According to Sheikh Kablan it is fairly easy to join the Shiite sect as long as you say the shahada, you have officially become a Muslim.
A little more than 2 years ago, Maronite Patriarch Beshara Rai condemned lawyers helping Catholic couples get divorced, and denounced the two churches who were taking money in exchange for a hasty divorce. Father George Massouh, the director of the center for Christian-Muslim studies in the University of Balamand, said in an interview for the daily star that these two churches were the Assyrian and Syriac Orthodox church.
In a phone interview with Archbishop George Saliba from the Syriac Orthdox Church, he said that they stopped converting other Christian sects into their own sect about 3 years ago, stating that “each person should solve his own problems in his own church”. Around Lebanon only about 4–5 people are in the process of converting to Syriac Orthodox, all of them Muslims, who either want to marry a Syriac Orthodox person or are interested in this specific faith. Father Chalres Mrad of the Syriac Ctholic Church said that he has heard in other churches that Muslim were converting to Christianity since they dear being associated with terrorists.
Father of the Assyrian church said that no one has tried to convert to Assyrian this year, and denied all the alleged allegations of divorce. He refused to talk further.
During this investigation a similar question was asked to the people responsible in different Christian sects: wither or not the Muslim Syrian refugees have approached them to change their religion to make travelling to Europe easier. The Maronite patriarchy in Beirut, the Syriac catholic church, the Assyrian church, along with the Coptic church have all said that they have not been approached by Muslim Syrian refugees. The Syriac orthodox church, and the Armenian catholic church said that they both would deny Syrian Muslim refugees from converting into their faith.
According to Christian Aid, U.S. non-profit organization, in 2013 1,200 Muslim refugees were baptized in Lebanon. Cynthia Finely, president of Christian Aid Mission, asked Christian Aid Workers in Lebanon among other counties if these conversions were real. In which they replied, that some are indeed rice Christians coming in only for help. Later on they refute their earlier statement saying “to say that they become Christians so they get food and clothing, I don’t think so.”
During a phone interview with Ziad Abdul Samad, a human rights instructor at the Lebanese American University, he said the trend of Muslim Syrian refugees, is indeed prevalent and resembles that of the Muslim Palestinian refugees who converted into Christianity just so they can become Lebanese citizen.
To conclude, if Lebanon does adapt a civil law, it would save a whole a lot of people a lot of trouble. If you have the freedom of choice to practice your own religion in Lebanon, you should also have the freedom of choice not too. According to Abdul Samad not adapting a civil law Lebanon shows the backwardness of this society.
