October 28, 2010
By Pat McCaughan

A strong passion to help others guided the Rev. Fatima Yakubu-Madus, daughter of a Muslim imam, to her recent ordination as a deacon in the Episcopal Diocese of Indianapolis.

"This has been a journey for me. I was born and raised a Muslim … my dad is an imam for a large congregation in my town," said Madus, who was ordained a vocational deacon Oct. 23 at St. Stephen's, Terre Haute, during the 173rd annual diocesan convention.

But for Madus, 54, the distance between her childhood in Auchi, in the southern Nigerian state of Edo, to her present vocation was closer than some might realize.

After arriving at Kentucky State University in Frankfort in 1979 to study chemistry and mathematics, she realized "it was very different from Nigeria. I couldn't really relate in terms of worship.

"Here, it's kind of segregated. There isn't that much interaction between Muslims and Christians," she said during an Oct. 28 telephone interview from her Indianapolis home.

"Growing up in my family compound, we had Christian tenants," she recalled. "We played together. I went to church with them. They came to the mosque with me. We did celebrations together. There was nothing like what you hear about Islam in this country."

She was baptized while enrolled in a postgraduate internship at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee, a decision supported by her Muslim relatives, she said.

"I wasn't raised to go through life without faith. When I was in Nigeria I went to a Catholic boarding school for high school and I already had an idea of what being a Christian is, so this is how I decided to become Christian.

"My dad told me when I was coming here to go to school that as long as you have faith in God, as long as you worship God, as long as you believe in God, that is all that's important. He never tried to force me to be Muslim, or said I have to be Muslim. The main thing is that you have faith in God."

Soon "I was very involved with church activities, because something I've always wanted to do is to help people," she said.

Shortly thereafter she moved to Indianapolis to work for Eli Lilly & Co., was divorced and joined Christ Church Cathedral, which sponsored her for ordination. She will serve at St. John's Church in Speedway.

Her family couldn't be happier for her, although they're not exactly sure what a deacon does, she said.

"They know I was ordained, although they don't know what a deacon is," she said laughingly. "But they know I've been a Christian for a long time and they know I wanted something more. They collected money to send to me for my vestments."

"My dad strongly believed that if you don't have faith in God, you don't have any anchor when anything happens. This has been a journey for me. I feel strongly that God has been calling me to be a deacon."

Bishop Cate Waynick told the gathering during the ordination that a deacon helps focus a church on evangelism and outreach, something Madus knows about.

She founded a nonprofit organization, We Care Missions Inc., and has organized medical missions to Nigeria for the past five years, bringing much-needed medicine and arranging for ongoing education and health care.

"Many people suffer from diabetes, hypertension and malaria," she said. "We have a group of people in Nigeria doing monthly screenings, at a clinic there and I send medicines to them on a quarterly basis," she said.

She enlists surgeons and other doctors and health care workers to provide free eye and other surgeries, health screenings and education in her village of Auchi as well as neighboring areas. She hopes to continue that ministry and to raise funds to continue purchasing medicines.

Recent anti-Muslim sentiment in the nation is disturbing to Madus, particularly because "often, what's reported or said is not true and there is no way you can tell people this is not true because they don't even know a Muslim as a friend," she said.

Although she has been Christian for "a very long time, I find myself being on the defensive, trying to explain to people when they make categorical statements about Islam. I try to tell them what it is.

"They don't understand that it's not Islam that produces terrorists; it's people that are in the Islamic faith that decide to be terrorists."

That misperception has complicated her medical mission endeavors also. "The people in my village now listen to what the media is saying. When they hear all these stories about how bad they are and how they are terrorists, they get really upset at the way they are being portrayed."

Although they know she was born in Nigeria and a Muslim now, "I am a U.S. citizen. I've lived here more than half my lifetime and I'm part of what is going on here," she said.

Nonetheless, "it's been a very good journey for me," she said. Her daughters are now 25 and 27; one is in graduate business school, the other a financial analyst.

"I feel very fortunate that I have been able to get to this point," Madus said. "I feel very fortunate for my children and everything that has happened and I really do appreciate it all."

Episcopal News Service
The Rev. Pat McCaughan is a national correspondent for the Episcopal News Service. She is based in Los Angeles.