Stumbling over the correct numbers to punch into a keypad to allow me a moment’s refuge in the library’s Postgraduate Room, I heard what sounded like a woman having a barney with some bloke. Curiosity got the better of me, so I paused to listen more carefully to what was going on in the closed room next door (some might call me nosey, but the noise was loud enough to attract bemused stares from other students entering and leaving the hallway).

“Praise Jesus, bring them to you Lord, praise Jesus, talladallawhalleywhalla*”

The strangeness of the prayer was that it was being shouted at the top of a woman’s lungs.

Many years ago, I had lived with a flatmate who attended the Assembly of God church, so I had some familiarity with pentecostal speaking-in-tongues praying, and figured out that such a prayer session was being held next to the Postgraduate Room.

It turned out there wasn’t any room-left-in-the-inn, so I went back out into the main entrance way to sit myself down at a table next to a window. I took off my shoes, sat down, opened up my laptop and tried to work out why I couldn’t find any books in the library by Cornell West.**

The praying was loud enough to make all passers-by take a second glance, and I could hear the mumble of noise–if not the precise words–where I was sitting. Praying in public is considered a strange affliction in Australia. Particularly if you have a microphone, I once quipped to a group of students. The effect of the loud, almost screaming, prayer was the same. We might tolerate a small bowed head and an amen here and there, but jumping up and down, waving arms, and speaking gibberish tends to make us Aussies ill-at-ease.

I thought about my discomfort and curiosity. Why was I attracted and repulsed at the same time by this strange prayer. I am no stranger to the concept of prayer, being Muslim I have even prayed in public a few times myself. But even my public prayer is private. Whispered words, and discreet movements, so that none might hear my conversation with my Lord.

In contrast, the pentecostal speaking-in-tongues prayer, interspersed with loud appeals for unbelievers to come to Christ, seemed like it was directed not so much to God, but to all who might inadvertently pass by. ‘Come and believe like us’ the prayer was saying ‘because we are the only ones who know the way to God’.

Perhaps I was superimposing my own prejudices on the prayers, after all I know that more fervent Pentecostals believe that theirs is the only true path to God, but I had not heard them specifically shouting out “everyone else is going to hell, except us.”

Finally, the prayer session was over, and out walked three people. One young woman and two young men. I was surprised. For all the noise, I was almost sure there were more of them. The woman glanced over at me. I almost willed her to come over to talk to me. I was curious to know why she was praying so loudly, and almost daring her to try and convert me.

Her gaze lingered on me, my hijab, my Muslimness. She paused as if almost to come over, with a look in her eye, but then turned away and walked on with her prayer-mates. Not today will this sinner be saved.

* I don’t have the precise transliteration, but just try closing your eyes and speaking gibberish, and you have the idea.

** Because his name is spelled Cornel West.