Singer Sinéad O'Connor has converted to Islam.
The Irish artist – known as Magda Davitt – announced on Twitter that she had changed her name to Shuhada' Davitt and thanked Muslims for their support.
She tweeted on October 19: 'This is to announce that I am proud to have become a Muslim. This is the natural conclusion of any intelligent theologian's journey. All scripture study leads to Islam. Which makes all other scriptures redundant.'
Yesterday Irish Imam Shaykh Dr Umar al-Qadri posted a video of her saying the shahada, the formal Islamic declaration of faith.
O'Connor has long been known for her fascination with religion, particularly with the formerly dominant Catholicism of her homeland. She sparked controversy in 1992 when she ripped up a photograph of the pope on a Saturday Night Live broadcast in the US as a protest against the Church. She was ordained as a priest a few years later by a breakaway church in Lourdes, the Irish Orthodox Catholic and Apostolic Church.
In 2007 interview with Christianity Today, O'Connor stated that she considers herself a Christian. She said, 'I think God saves everybody whether they want to be saved or not. So when we die, we're all going home... I don't think God judges anybody. He loves everybody equally.'
Also in 2007 she revealed she had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder four years previously.
