CLOSE-UP : The Lone Star of Islam

When Nancy Lydick left Texas for L.A. back in 1978, her family thought she was doomed. “My father was aghast,” she recalls. “None of the women in our family had ever left Texas. They thought I’d get into drugs, that there’d be an earthquake and everything would fall into the ocean.”

Drugs were not a problem, though earthquakes were, and Lydick’s life did take on a La La Land cast: She became a psychologist, changed religions twice and wound up on TV, the only American woman to co-anchor an internationally televised show for Muslims.

Born a Christian, Lydick explored several denominations before converting to Judaism at 30. Then in 1982, Lydick met a Muslim man from West Africa. “I was impressed with his inner peace. He gave me a copy of the Koran. It made sense to me; everything I had studied and knew fell together, all my questions were answered,” Lydick says.

During her long quest “for the truth and universal oneness,” she had also been flirting with show biz, acting in several plays and once on “Dallas.” Her dramatic and spiritual pursuits merged in 1985 when she won her job on “Islam,” a newsmagazine show that is taped here and broadcast in the Mideast, Asia, Mexico and the United States (though not in L.A.). On camera, her name is Nashiha al-Sakina--”tranquil adviser”--an apt nom de TV for a psychologist who teaches at National University’s L.A. campus and has a private therapy practice in Long Beach.

Meanwhile, the eyes of the Lone Star state watch in bemusement. “Although my conservative family still can’t quite understand it, they have shifted from thinking I’ve lost my mind to having admiration, respect and love for me,” says Lydick, who is divorced and has two children and three grandkids. “They don’t think of me as some crazy person who belongs to a cult anymore.”