my name is wilfredo and henrys
i was born with that name now people
call me wilfredo amer
i'm a puerto rican born attorney and
chaplain
something happened in my life in 2003
that changed it
i embrace islam
from that point on
my life have take many turns
to unexpected places with unexpected
duties catering to unexpected people
and right now i'm on my way to meet a
good friend
and i'm excited because it's the one of
the few times out of those hundreds of
times that media have interviewed me
that is a muslim media so
believe it or not i'm kind of nervous
i'm used to to any news national
international local news to interview me
and now
it's just a friendly muslim media and
perhaps it gets me more excited than
than the regular
international news outlets and things
like that so i'm excited to meet brother
eddie he's waiting for me my office
here in sunrise south florida
and uh i hope this goes well i believe
you're gonna enjoy this
so that's the same thing inshallah yes
yes how do you how do you say peace be
with you in spanish
i think they've figured out already
nice to have you here in florida nice to
have you nice to be here with you so now
that we've broken the ice a little bit
tell me so you actually you were a
attorney back in
puerto rico yes yes and then from there
the story went on to you being attorney
here exactly fighting for muslims rights
yes yeah it was a long journey but i'm
here that's what i'm doing yes i'm
blessed uh
in 2003
after after some
search on on
what religion should i educate my
children
with
uh
one day i was driving in a city called
vega alta in the suburbs of san juan
and i observed an islamic center that
you can see in a hillside from the
expressway
and i said
i'm going to learn about islam
and that was end of 2002
early 2003 january 2003
i embrace islam
in that same islamic center i pronounce
my shahada
tell us your life before i got educated
in a catholic school most of my life
from
from first to middle school yeah on high
school i went to a public secular school
but yes i was raised catholic most of my
family is catholic i don't know at all
but very practicing catholics my brother
yes my mother was and my sister they're
practicing catholics describe for our
audience
what does it mean to be like a
practicing typical day of a practicing
catholic in your family those of
christians that are considered the same
practicing they attend the weekend
service yeah uh and if you're catholic
you you participate in the sacraments
you take the eucharist or you
you go and confess your sins uh there
are some call sacraments that are some
core practices of your religion that if
you're a practicing catholic you will do
non-practicing catholic is
when you abandon those
practices and no longer relate to a
particular church but you still hold
some of the beliefs of christianity or
you consider yourself christian right
because that's how you got educated even
if you don't practice it yeah you
normally approach the the church then
for extraordinary events awaiting a
baptism or or a funeral
and and
the same happens
in in all religions there are people
that adhere to the practices of their
religions and they're practicing in our
case muslims
that then we'll do the five daily
prayers we'll fast in ramadan we aspire
or go to and perform hajj
and
that is something that that just
naturally came in to me when i after me
becoming
muslim i got uh
passionate about learning about islam
when i first embraced islam
i wanted to learn it
more than
what the
it was being offered in in the islamic
centers and i wanted to have some
academic instruction uh on islam so i
shortly after embracing islam in 2003
like in 2004 or five i started uh
a program in the hartford seminary
it was a master's degree program on
islam and christian muslim relations
and i was also at the same time hoping
that they will pay for the studies but
they did not i i reconnected with an old
institution that i was connected before
when i was an attorney in my early years
as as an attorney before embracing islam
i joined the navy in their jack corps so
the navy have different court for
dentist for professional court they have
a court for
attorneys
and i joined that and i worked as a
active duty in the military as a navy
jag
i was a defense counsel
after that i i went to my private
practice
and then when i encountered islam
i thought hey
the navy was paying me as a job perhaps
if i get a professional degree in
islamic studies they may have they may
pay for my studies or something like
that so i i reconnected with the navy
and and i i joined them and i
again swore was sworn in in what they
had a program called the
chaplain can candidate programs officers
program the ccpo
uh so while you're starting in the
seminary you are in the chaplain court
as a seminarian right so i had the
opportunity to join the navy while
during my studies
on islam
this time as one of the few
in the chaplain court because in the
whole fleet there were only four muslim
chaplains back then
uh so i was very privileged to hold that
to be in that court of very few muslims
who were catering the interesting thing
is we cater to muslims and non-muslims
when you're serving in the armed forces
so that that that was a in a snapshot
where where how my my life
changed within being an attorney to
becoming a chaplain
and and and start incorporating islam in
my life because this opportunity is the
one in the navy and one that i have soon
after to work as a chaplain in the
immigration detention centers first in
puerto rico and later here in florida uh
it was working with christian
institutions but i was present i mean i
presented myself as a muslim chaplain
and they did hire my services to lead to
to direct the religious services program
in those centers
let's go back a little bit because you
know here a lot of people are going away
from religion or some people say i
believe in god but i don't want to
follow any ass so i don't want to follow
any organized religion
you know how was the temple at that time
you coming up you know from your young
adult years you know and a lot of times
i can imagine you know you got the latin
music and now the songs are filled with
you know chasing this and that the bling
bling i don't know if they call it yeah
it wasn't the bling bling back then
because they were older yeah
that that generation but yes it was
but what was it that had you you know
strike a chord that you started to go
down that route that you're now thinking
more you know thinking more about
purpose of life why am i here why have i
been created these really important
questions that a lot of people they're
so tuned into the song and they're numb
to all the the reality of these type of
things important things that we should
be thinking about you know eddie when i
first started visiting the islamic
centers and and
and i heard those first dars first
lessons on islam yeah uh
honestly when i was listening to to the
discussions of tawhi
the concept of god
it was something that it was not new for
me
it was something that
i when i
first heard and
listened to
people talking about tawheed and how
that is essential to our faith that is
the essence of our faith
uh
i i that naturally resonated to me why
because when i was christian
i always truly never was convinced
never i received uh an adequate
explanation or on the concept of the
trinity
that
what what is known in christianity is
triune three and one god
father son holy spirit
uh that concept
when
i
had that first ex
exposes to of of what is
what this means in islam and the
importance of it and how
believing in the one god is really what
our faith is about
the the rest
are
what falls from it
and
to to discover that that was the essence
of a religion and that the essence of
that religion that belief was something
that i naturally believed in
that god was one the creator
i perfectly fit nobody ever needed to
try to explain me in islam the concept
of the one god
when it was exposed to me and this is
our teaching and i was taught that
i didn't have any questions
because i said this is what i have
always truly believed god was created
in spanish
and that's not broken up into parts like
a trinity
and
i found that in islam
the
reason and our heart
perfectly conjugates perfectly get along
ours is not only logical religion
for example to believe that
something or someone that you believe is
god could suffer thirst or hunger
or to be born one day
or die for three days
or being offered something
as a temptation by by your creation
because even the shaitaan is your
creation yes so what the shaitaan is
going to offer you
his creator to tempt you that's a good
point yes so all those things
quickly had an answer
when
i embraced the thought and the belief of
the tawheed of the one god the pure
monotheism the pure monophysim because
he's truly logical you say god can never
be born
god is the owner of everything what can
he be offered uh
what can he be offered you can't offer
me anything
of everything so uh or be born or be or
suffer hunger or thirst
or
or offer a sacrifice for his creation
as is the creation was superior to him
while in tawhid
there are nothing
higher than allah our belief that allah
is the highest
is essential
so you cannot put the highest
offering
something to his creation
it is the contrary his creation should
be offering sacrifices on his behalf
should creation be offerings acts of
gratitude to them
the creation should be offered the
worshipping to him there's nothing for
him it's just the
the blessings and the barakas and the
mercy as he wants to extend it to
humanity when you learn this
obviously this makes sense this is very
logical that god is not his creation
he's the creator of creation that you
worship only the creator not the
creation when you're sharing this
now with your family
what are they saying because they're
practicing
christians
there were many reactions
from being very welcome
as something as a new teaching in my
inner circle my my children my family in
her family it was it was okay
i i didn't went
back home saying this is what everybody
needs to start believing that's your
answer i did explain what is it that i
embrace and what is this religion about
uh the same happened
in my in my mother's realm right my
mother her husband my stepfather
for her was hardest because she was a
practicing christian that had leadership
positions in her church
christians normally go once a week to
church my mother will go every day
so it's a little atypical
christian not every christian not even
the majority all half of them goes every
day to church as my mother used to do
and she took other leadership positions
as well and in within this church and
and
she was very active she sent she wanted
also educated as catholics she set us to
catholic school so for her it was
it was hard for some months
i can gladly tell you
that after some months
there were
a christmas season
where i received a sashda
a muslim prayer rug as a christmas gift
from my mother
so that tells you the level of
acceptance
that she
finally embraced to the level that
her gifts was were to encourage me
to be even more profoundly involved with
my faith
so uh
it evolved
the inner core of friends were there
they knew that there were other
practices now that i probably will not
join them as i used to
uh
but the inner core i can tell you they
were always there there's others that
people call friends that are that an
outer core of friends that they were
just acquaintances of your of your
entertainment right uh or other circles
right and and those are quickly quickly
disappear
it has been something
very
how can i explain you eddie
from the first time i
learned in that month about islam
i became fascinated by islam
it was natural for me to wanting to seek
more knowledge and seek it in in a
seminary
it was natural for me to to
to be a voice for islam in biking puerto
rico for many years i was a a regular
columnist in the main circulation
newspaper all my columns were about
islam and the practice of what we
muslims do so you accepted islam and
then you started writing in the puerto
rican newspaper yeah islam is that
how was that taken by the your readers
oh it was it was
i received the love letter saying hey i
do i'm not muslim i do respect your
religion or when i'm learning about it
or
from another's insulting letters right
yeah uh it all started with me offering
as i was attending the seminary
a talk
to the
editorial board of that newspaper saying
while i'm visiting puerto rico
during my breaks from the seminary i'm
more than willing to give a talk to all
the journalists for free about what is
islam and you know back then
the we had already wars going that got
the interest in the bad way uh on
muslims it was 2003 2004
fresh from september 11.
so i can tell you that most of puerto
ricans were very welcoming of on the
information yeah they were either
misinformed by ignorance or
intentionally misinformed by catholic
schools who intentionally misinformed on
on who
especially older practices now
i see a more
especially in the recent 15 years
open
openness to to for knowledge about islam
by people of all religions they really
welcome
and they come to my school and speak
about islam or come to my college and
speak about islam
but when that happened i gave that that
talk to the
to the journalists that that morning it
was like a two three hour talk
normally these talks take the director
later told me an hour and i was already
there two two and a half past two hours
and the journalists were asking
gazillion questions about our deen about
islam and the muslim faith because
remember they're just
most of them touch islam tangentially
because it's the religion of something
or because it's a religion that
practices some kind of people some
people from these where we have a
conflict in iraq or afghanistan but as a
religion when they have the opportunity
to hear what is it our beliefs that what
are what are our practices uh the the
status of our family our mo our woman
our men our children uh our
responsibilities as muslims uh when they
started learning about that they really
got
a super interest there's a thirst
for people to know islam not necessarily
because they're looking for a spiritual
path
people are very curious about islam
especially since september 11 to this
day you will not find a single issue of
a newspaper that doesn't mention the
word muslim or islam somewhere in the
newspaper for good or bad
it's a constant in our culture now
and even though it is a constant
a lot of people admit they're very
ignorant about the faith so these
opportunities this really opened me uh
open our community than puerto ricans uh
perhaps a window to what is islam and
there were some issues that were more
controversial for example when we were
discussing the palestinian rights and
and and
how how their rights are violated in
israel
obviously those are contentious
statements not only in the united states
from everywhere in the caribbean where
you raise it right uh they're easily
misconstrued right and
that was something that after many years
of writing in the paper they even called
me in recent years say could you please
as a guest columnist write about again
about the palestinian conflict
because uh
media knows
there is a
vacuum of information when it comes to
the rights of muslims in palestine to
the rights of muslims in china the
uighur muslims to the rights of muslims
the rohingya muslims to the rights of
muslims that reside in russia
and the residual the rights of muslims
throughout europe and africa so
those right those
are
normally
topics
that
they don't want to be talked about and
in our culture mainly
with the assertion that we have nothing
to do with that
and we experience that it is on the
contrary what affects syrians affects us
what affects afghans affects us what
affects iraqis affects us
so we are coming to know on the hard way
our communities that muslims will not go
anywhere
muslims are here to stay
the muslim community is one of the
fastest growing communities religious
communities in america this is not that
would you like that to be or me like
that's a fact
so people need to really start
wanting to learn legitimately learn
about us and they're curious and we
always find those people that that that
motivates me to do what i'm doing now
that is to defend the rights of muslims
to practice the religion
because very early when i started to
practice my religion
the bombs that hispanic muslims
were suffering after
embracing islam
those that embraced islam that were
hispanics and if you had another layer
they were imprisoned
that moved me to to to eventually
gravitate to to work in in civil rights
like i'm doing with care florida
and
i've been
next year it's going to be 20 years of
me becoming muslim alhamdulillah
half of those have been directly working
with care florida
first as an attorney and now as a
communications director but uh
very determined that the rest of my life
is going to be for the service of the
muslim community it could be freud for
the rest of my life but if not in care
florida i don't see me
doing other things that serving
the muslin community to for them to have
for our kids and our grandkids to have a
better place that that
what we found here
and
and that they don't need to suffer what
we have suffered here or listen from
even the
the greatest leaders of our country how
they insult our religion even in century
21.
uh
uh i hope they they have a better
america than the one we are inheriting
and
i feel very good doing it it's very
satisfying
uh putting all my knowledge as an
even the third my attorney's experience
throughout my life
the experience as a chaplain and as a
communicator
for the sake of our community is really
perhaps what fits
me spiritually
because it's part of we know
as muslims that
this is how we worship
that every act that we try to do
on the way allah told us to do it
is
as good as worship as allah as good as
worship as any other worship
and and and i have
found that my
preferred
way of grow worship is serving my
community saving protecting
the muslim community educating
the muslim community on the right
uh
making them stand pride for their
identity
right when they see
a convert openly
practicing islam that they don't mind
looking muslim
muslims or muslim brothers or sisters
it's truly
an experience right and
and that i know
says a lot
about
islam i can tell you when i did hashtag
was blessed to do hajj in 2007.
uh
whenever i was introduced to anyone in
any store or in any circle
they stop whatever they were talking
to say could you tell me your story
about how you embrace islam
it was of utmost
exaltation to them to learn
how somebody embrace islam in america
and
this is
nothing
in my life no there's no other
experience
i can tell you about i have experience
in my life
that equates to
what happened
after i embraced islam in 2003. this is
very beautiful and very motivated to see
someone who not only accepted the dean
accepted this beautiful way of life but
now
had that passion to continue
moving forward writing in the newspapers
educating people sharing because if you
share you care if you care you're
sharing you've been sharing
and putting your experience to work
serving the dean serving your creator
serves your community i want to thank
you for that if for the spanish-speaking
audience
can you go ahead and leave us with
something in this puerto rican spanish
language
you know too yes of course
one more time we started with peace we
end with peace
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