I was born into a Muslim family in a Muslim commuity here in the UK. As a boy I was schooled at the mosque with the teachings of the Quran and the Sufi would beat it into us with a chair leg with a nail in the end of it. It was then as a young boy that I began to question the teachings of Islam. Needless to say, me and my two younger brothers were banned from the mosque and eventually we were not allowed to attened any mosques in our community.

As a teenager I spent two years travelling accross Pakistan and I saw Christians and Hindus persecuted by Muslims because of their religions. They had no legal rights and were abused incessantly and I was dismayed by this and I tried to help them and was admonished for doing so. I did not see religious boundries: I saw human beings.

I studied the Hadiths and the Koran further, I studied the Biblical texts, the Torah and the Bhagvad Gita and other religious texts and scholars looking for answers and for a forgiving, helpful and loving God but found only division and hatred between religious peoples.

As an history acadmic, I went back to the origins of religious belief, looking for answers in ancient Eygptian, Sumerian, Babylonian, Native American and Aborigional texts and found striking similarities and clear connections to Abrahamic religions and practices, again looking for answers to a higer power which could unite human kind as one in life and death as some of these pre-Abrahamic faiths practiced and still practice today.

Suprisingly, I actually found something I could beleive in and an un-shakable faith...IN ME! Yes, I know it sounds selfish and my ideas have caused me much pain from others but I have never lost faith in myself to be a good human being to other human beings and I do not need a book, a prophet, a building or a doctrine to tell me that.

The universe is not as big as you think and if you wanted to, and you can think it, you can travel to places you can only imagine but that doesn\'t mean its not real.

Peace be with you (in the name of humanityand huwomanty).
Danny.