Bumper Stickers

The other day on my way to Arabic class, we circled a roundabout behind the colorful van emblazoned with a message similar to "Want to learn more about Islam? Stop me to find out how." At the time, Steve and I were listening to "Personal Jesus," which in my mind was somehow morphing into "Personal Allah." I've been thinking a fair bit lately about similarities between the Islam practiced here and the prevailing type of Christianity found back in the Bible Belt. I think the bumper stickers here can pretty well summarize the direction of my thoughts. Far more prevalently than even back home, one sees cars plastered with bumper stickers of a religious variety (almost exclusively, except for those goofy cartoon boy outlines or sometimes some sort of a national pride sticker). The most common are "Masha Allah," which I'm going to translate as "Praise God from Whom All Blessings Flow," but also conveys a sense of divine fate akin to "Thy Will Be Done," and "Alhamdulillah," which apparently comes from the same root as "Hallelujah" and is "Thanks Be to God." A third phrase that nearly always makes me think of home when I hear it is "Insha'allah," which in my mind becomes "Good Lord Willing." This one is also the root of the Spanish "Ojala." It implies that nothing in the future is certain, but all is dependent on God's will. (Of course, sometimes it has a particular usage trending more toward whatever is being discussed is only going to happen through divine intervention! Context and user intent are key ...)