Khilafat Centenary Souvenir 1908-2008 — Page 157
captivated by his face. I was captivated by the letters he would write in Urdu to the missionary and the missionary would read his letters to us in English at every meeting on Saturdays. I always had the urge to meet him and I was planning to go to Pakistan to meet him. I was planning to become a missionary, that was why I was in Washington, D. C. I stayed there 3 years, but then I changed my mind about becoming a missionary. I think it was one of the worst moves I made in my life by not taking that opportunity that was offered to me by the Movement, and I said I did not want to go overseas and I stayed over here in the United States. Munib: In that time at the age of 15, how was the concept of Khalifa explained to you, because it must have been a new concept to you? I was born into Christianity as a Baptist. So my concept of a spiritual leader was never there. I may have looked at the Pope as the leader of the Catholics, but the Catholics only. But as a Christian, the only being we focused on was J esus as as being up where the Creator was (Istighfarullah, may Allah forgive me). All my memories of Jesus were from pictures that were painted in the church. The Church was set up so that when you sat in the pew facing forward, you would see all these pictures of Jes us with a halo on his head, and holding a little lamb with children running up to him. He was beaming and had the halo. And in the back of the church there would a picture of God depicted with a lightning bolt in one hand and something else in the other hand. He would have a grey beard and a mean look on his face. So my primary focus at the time was onjesus as. So when I came into the Movement and was told that this is your spiritual leader and your Imam, it did not really register with me at first. I respected his position, but in terms of getting to know what the position was about, it took me many, many years before I discovered what the institution of Khilafat was about. We looked at the Khalifa as being the final word, because whenever the Missionary would get a letter from him, he would shake if it was one of those letters where he was reprimanded. You could tell that this was not a good letter. And he would busy himself in the office. We looked at it as the Khalifa is the boss. Munib: When was the turning point when you began to understand the concept of Khilafat and what it really means? When I went to Pakistan in 1982, I went as a delegate at the Majlis-e-Shura which was held in April. When I got there, I had planned to complain to the Khalifa'• (Hadhrat Khalifatul Masih ill) about all of the complaints I had stored up in my mind about Pakistanis not liking us and we not liking Pakistanis, and this and that and every little thing. People would come up to me before I left and say, 'tell the Khalifa about this and tell the Khalifa about that. ' So I had so much stuff in my brain that when I went in to meet him that day, I had pumped myself up the previous night and I said this is the opportunity that I have to tell the Khalifa'• about these issues, and he, in an instant, could change things in America. So I went in and my mind closed down; literally, it closed down, and I began crying profusely and he beckoned me to come to him and I walked over to him and fell into his arms. And tears were coming out of me and he had a white Achkan (long tailored coat) on, and I was laying on his left shoulder and that was drenched with my tears and he kept patting me on my back, patting me on my back, patting me on my back. And that must have lasted a good 3 minutes and then I sat down. Then he said, "Do you have something to tell me?" and I said' no '. And he started asking me questions about myself. So what happened was that I thought to myself that maybe the first meeting was too emotional and I need to have a second time with him. So, I asked permission, and I said I was going to be there for the next 32 days and I asked if I have permission to see you again. And he said, "Of course, anytime and in fact everyday if you want to come here, you can come and see me everyday, just make an appointment with the private secretary. " So, the second day, when I woke up, I did the same thing. I went over to his office and I had to wait for a while before he could see me. And I was pumping myself up and I went in and I cried again. I couldn't get anything out at all. So it dawned on me that maybe Allah Almighty did not want me to say these things that I had on my mind because a lot had to do with Satanic influence about complaining and finding faults with the organization that I belong to. So I said, let me just experience what I have to experience her e in Rabwah itself.