Christian priest who converted to Islam performs Haj on King’s invitation
Saudi king Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud asked Ibrahim Richmond, a former Christian priest from south africa who just converted to islam, to conduct the Haj this year. Three months ago, Richmond converted to islam after having a dream encounter with a "divine voice." From his church, many of Christians followed suit and converted to Islam.
Richmond and hundreds of his followers were seen reciting the Shahadah (testimony of faith) in a viral video that went viral in March. Richmond revealed the event that convinced him to convert to islam in a new video that the Saudi government aired on twitter on Sunday. He claims, "I was a priest for 15 years, and I was the leader of the congregation in the church, which has 100,000 followers until I saw the dream."
Richmond observed him "sleeping in the church in a very small room." He remembers: "Then, I heard a divine voice, telling me: Tell your men to wear white." Richmond experiences this dream repeatedly during the next few days. "The voice got louder each time." Richmond then went to the church and shared the dream with his disciples. "I said the shahadah in the same church three months earlier, and they agreed with me and did it again. I later noticed a Muslim brother approaching us. I confessed to him that I had been waiting for him and that I had dreamed he would visit," he recalls.
In response to being invited to make the journey, he remarked, "I wasn't sure when I initially accepted. I believed I couldn't leave. But now that I'm here, millions of my people will do the same in order to follow the Prophet Muhammad's example and get to the light.