The Baitul Salaam Network
Story
Baitul Salaam
Network, Inc. began as an answer to a question posed at an Iftar January 16, 1997. Four of us (women) sat on the floor of
my humble apartment in one of the worst apartment complexes in the city and just questioned what was going on in our lives
at that moment. We looked at what had happened in our respective recent pasts, and we challenged ourselves to be and do better.
The answer came when we hosted our first event at one of the local Islamic centers about a year later.
We invited a local ordained female minister to speak on the subject of "Internalized Oppression."
Most of us had heard the lecture and were so touched and healed by it that we knew everyone in the world would want to hear
it. We asked her to join us for Iftar before she would speak. We knew we would have a nice size audience. Well, wrong. Although
there were about a hundred people only fifty or so steps away, only two (men) joined us for the presentation. We knew then
we would have an interesting journey ahead.
It is now almost 15
years later and the road for us as a domestic violence awareness organization has been peppered with temporary setbacks (closing
of the shelter project twice), minimal to almost no support from those we thought we be on the front lines with us (many of
our sisters especially our professional sisters), and subtle to overt backlash. We have learned from it all to stand firm
in our belief in Allah and to trust Allah for all of our personal and organizational needs. We also have gained the respect
and true loyalty of a committed and very diverse local and national support base.
With the help of Allah we have made it to a benchmark in our history as an organization. We are at the place
we off times thought we would not make. With humility and pride we can look back at assisting 700 women and children
through the shelter program We can look back at answering over 9,000 (conservative estimate) telephone calls yearly.
We can take pride in our part as a catalyst
in blazing a trail in stirring up the consciousness of our community and take pride in now having just over a dozen domestic
violence awareness organizations and support groups that have started since our inception in 1997. We can take pride as Muslim
Men Against Domestic Violence begins to take steps toward organizing and standing on its own. We can give praise to
Allah and marvel at the miracle of our local citywide Majlis Ash Shura here in Atlanta beginning to develop a task force to
work with us (and others) to study and take action against the apathy of our community in not dealing with domestic
abuse as they would any other crime in our community.
We have seen some of our
friends, supporters and fellow domestic violence awareness activists return to Allah (Sr. Sharifa Al Khatib of the Peaceful
Family Project) a few of our devoted and loving supporters (Brother Malcolm Shabazz, Brother McDonald Rasheed and Sr. Samadah
Nur) and loved ones as well (former Advisory Committee Chair Evelyn L. Ganther-Spencer--my mom). We have much
to be grateful for and many reasons to celebrate in praise to Allah. As we move forward and continue to grow as an organization,
let us always be mindful to give all the praise to Allah and continue to be grateful.
Hadayai Majeed, Project Administrator
15 July 2010
Atlanta, Georgia
