Trust me, don’t do it if you will not believe in the religion. Tell your girlfriend that you don’t feel that you can convert to Islam and see what she says. Talk through it, because lying will come crashing down really fast.

I know multiple stories about this exact same situation, but I will tell you the two most recent ones. Both involve a Muslim woman who wanted to marry a non-muslim man.

First story: The man converted to Islam and truly believed in the religion and did it on his own accord. He converted because he wanted to marry the girl, but he also put in commitment to the religion. He is very happy with his conversion and they are in a very strong marriage. He has a lot of support from the wife’s family and from people in the local Muslim community and they constantly reach out to him and everything is really good for him. He converted and truly believed in the religion/beliefs.

Second story: Sams situation, the guy did not “truly” convert to Islam. He pretended to convert just to get married, but didn’t commit to the religion. It ended up really badly for both the woman and man. The non-Muslim man realized that if he was going to spend the rest of his life with the Muslim woman, he would be required to follow the religion and he did not want to follow Islam, so less than a year into their marriage they divorced. The woman also realized that she wanted her kids to grow up under the religion and if she married a non-muslim, it would never work out for her kids and future family, so she agreed to divorce, but was really emotionally hurt for a long time from it.

Bottom line: don’t force yourself to join the religion if you will not believe it. The marriage will end really badly and it will just hurt your girlfriend more than you will realize. In the second story I mention, the girl eventually re-married after around 2 years. During those 2 years, she was so broken by what her husband did since their entire marriage was based on a lie and a false commitment. It was one of the saddest things I had ever seen, especially since my family knew this Muslim women and her family fairly well.