Sealy, who is the Caribbean Examinations Council’s assistant registrar for corporate strategy and business development, was a Catholic but admitted that she could have been “a better Christian”.

“Most of us say we’re Christian because we go to church but how much do we really put into learning about Christianity?” she asked, noting that around the time she was learning about Islam, she was also trying to find out more about Christianity.

“It kind of coincided, well, that I was actually comparing the Bible with the Koran and also the way that Islam is practised as a way of life with the way that we were as Christians.

“I didn’t find that it was different from what we were taught as Christians. For example, the prophets are the same and we’re told you have to believe in the other monotheistic religions, so you can’t say that you don’t recognize Judaism or Christianity and be a Muslim,” she said.

One of the things that drew her into Islam was the emphasis on prayer.

“Before I even decided that I wanted to be Muslim, I read so much about  prayer and what prayer five times a day was supposed to do for a human being that I thought I would start to try praying as Muslims do, using the words and everything.

“I wanted to see if it was true that praying five times a day would help you to feel more settled, [if] you would feel closer in your relationship to God than just what [Christians] did . . . just pray at any point or in the mornings and at night before you go to sleep,” she remarked.

Sealy admitted that Islam sounded strict at first but said she liked that it “gives you some measure of control over your own actions”.

“Covering your hair was a bit strange-sounding until I was reminded that I was Catholic and wanted very much to be a nun, I thought, when I was young.

When I look at the nuns, really there is no difference in how nuns dress,” she said.

She noted that women often asked if her clothing didn’t make her hot since Muslim women must be covered to their wrists and ankles and their necks cannot be exposed.

“The perception is always that you are wearing more clothes than anybody else. Realistically, if you look outside, all the people who wear uniforms are wearing the same type of clothing and a lot of women are tying their hair. It’s just you’ve tied yours a bit differently.

“I don’t find that it is any hotter than before I used to dress like this.”

Sealy said it took a while for those closest to her to accept her conversion. Not only was it the biggest test in her marriage, but she said her parents “are still trying to get accustomed to the fact that I am Muslim and thinking that it’s a phase that I may be going through”.

“It really is a struggle every day to be submissive to God because you live in a society that is for the most part permissible for so many things,” she pointed out. “If you’re in a minority group and you’re interacting with people all day long, you do tend to fall back into what you’ve known all your life.”

Belief in one God

In a separate interview, secretary of the Barbados Muslim Association Suleiman Bulbulia explained that the fundamental aspect of Islam was belief in one God. This is considered to be the first pillar of the religion.

“Allah is the name for God in Arabic, so whether you’re Muslim or Christian and you speak Arabic, it is Allah,” Bulbulia said.

“Along with that in the first pillar of Islam is belief in the prophets of God and belief in the final prophet Mohammed. We believe in all the prophets that came before.”

However, he said Muslims also believed the final message of Islam and the last revelation which was the Koran came to Mohammed. The other pillars of the religion are prayer five times a day, fasting for 29 or 30 days annually, giving to charity and making a pilgrimage to Mecca once in a lifetime if one could afford it.

Bulbulia noted that several Barbadians had entered into Islam over the years, starting in the 1960s.Although the first known Muslims came about 100 years ago, many slaves from West Africa were Muslim by belief, he noted.

He added that while more research needed to be done, there was reason to believe that some who came to Barbados were Muslim.

“We’re told the slaves were buried and their face was (towards the) east,” he said. “In Islam when you bury an individual you put their face towards Mecca; from Barbados that is east.”

Bulbulia said that because so many Muslims here were from India, previously a lot of people thought Islam was an Indian religion.

However, he noted that Islam in India was a minority religion while 75 per cent of Africa was Muslim.

Bulbulia added that many people interested in Islam often had misconceptions about the Muslim view of Jesus and the role of women.

“A lot of people don’t understand the prophet Jesus has a high position in Islam. Because you’re coming from a Christian background, they feel as though we relegate the person of Jesus. We do believe in the miraculous birth and that He did miracles. Where we differ is on the question of divinity,” he said.

“In Islam the woman has a strategic and important role. She is the mother to children, she is a wife to her husband and she is a leader of the house itself in terms of raising the kids. She is the first teacher and her role is not in any way inferior.”

Within Islamic societies the man has the responsibility to be the breadwinner but the couple may agree that the woman will work outside the home as well.

And contrary to what some might believe, Bulbulia stressed that Muslim women were educated.

Sealy said that many Barbadian Muslim women attended very good schools and had certificates.