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 ten 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 591 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 (now three years old) 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
21 July, 2007
Atlanta, Georgia
