Conversations About Masjid Leadership: Role of the Masjid

By On · 5 Comments · In Leadership, Masjids
This entry is part 2 of 3 in the series Conversations About Masjid Leadership

Conversations About Masjid Leadership

We are pleased to launch this new video series addressing issues of Masjid leadership. The intent behind this series is to provide a frank discussion about issues of concern to our communities. Problems such as leadership, board politics, and youth involvement are not unique to any one Masjid.

Our Muslim community first faced a crisis of survival – when the first wave of immigrants rose to the challenge and established institutions such as Masjids, community centers, and Islamic schools. The new crisis we face is one of relevancy. Our communities are struggling to take the next step to make sure our community infrastructure is ready to meet the demands of the coming generation.

It is with this in mind that we are launching this important series of interviews with Shaykh AbdulNasir Jangda. We hope to cover more topics and also involve other speakers as well.

Our first video is entitled, ‘Role of the Masjid’.

This video covers a number of issues, among them:

  • What is the true role and purpose of the masjid? (Refer to this MuslimSI article on an organization’s true purpose)
  • How does a community balance competing objectives with limited resources? Specifically, how to balance between the demands of Islamic schools, Sunday schools, and Friday prayer.
  • How to make women’s prayer space?
  • What is most pressing when embarking on a new masjid project?

Enjoy the first video below. The next video will cover how to find the right imam.

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Series NavigationTrailer for Our New Video Series: Conversations About Masjid LeadershipConversations About Masjid Leadership: Finding the Right Imam

About Omar Usman

Omar Usman is a founding member of MuslimMatters, Qalam Institute, Muslim Strategic Initiative, and Debt Free Muslims. He is a regular khateeb and has served in different administrative capacities in various national and local Islamic organizations. You can follow him on Google+ or on Twitter @ibnabeeomar.

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  • Abdullah Syed

    Alhamdulillah someone is talking about these issues. I have to give props to my current masjid mashaAllah. Islamic Center of Irving has:
    1) A welcome-day every Monday (where they introduce new community members and welcome those who have returned from long trips)
    2) A dawah team (with their own office!) – to deal with requests from non-Muslims and new Muslims
    3) A separate cry-room / father’s room with clear walls (so other worshipers wont get disturbed by little kids crying, etc.)
    4) A quarterly open house for the non-Muslim community
    5) A must needed cleaning service, that comes and cleans the bathrooms, hallways, prayer spaces (etc), every day.
    6) In the summer they are having sports for all ages – Everything from flag-football, tennis, cricket… and of course the outdoor basketball court gets used (and abused) before and after (and sometimes during!) every salah, every day of the week.
    7) The people in-charge are very approachable, alhamdulillah.

    What they do lack is someone who can coach, guide, talk to the youth on a daily basis.  I think they need two, fun, religious-minded, part-time (evening & weekend) youth counselors. One for our young brothers and one for our young sisters.

     I also hate their announcements!! Although they make so many announcements, they lack a method of getting all the events announcements in one place, at one time. For that the Houston community has an awesome weekly newsletter called Houston Weekly Events. Over 3,300 people receive a weekly email outlining most of the events going on in town.

  • http://twitter.com/Sadik_Ibrahim Sadik Ibrahim

    Sallam,

    This video was
    fantastic, (I should have watched this before I posted my earlier email)

    Everything that
    was discussed in the video were factors that made me start my project. The
    problem is, a lot of people want change but what are they doing about it.
    Things don’t just happen, they have to make a concerted effort. I hope Inshallah
    people watch this and realise that these discussions are exactly what they are
    thinking but not saying.

    My project to
    get masjids on the web was all about this, to give a voice to those who can’t
    get to masjids, to ask the board members and the imams questions that you wouldn’t
    necessarily face to face, but more importantly, restoring the Masjid as the hub
    of the community.

    It’s a shame
    you guys are on the other side of the pond, would have been great to work with
    you.

    Let me know if
    my website would be of any use to you in your work to facilitate change, as per
    previous post, its going through a design change and some debugging before we
    promote it properly in about 6 weeks. 

    Sadik

    http://www.pbuu.net

    • http://twitter.com/ibnabeeomar ibn abee omar

      jazakallahu khayr for your comments! you hit it on the head, we want to take the first step and put the discussion out there on points people are thinking but not necessarily saying. 

      keep up the good work, maybe as we progress further along and get some more content and ideas on our site then we can start looking at next steps :)

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  • http://www.quranreading.com/ Quran Tutor

    If you ask me that what should be the qualities of Imam of Mosque in current era than i will say you that he really need to understand technology. This is the era of technology and social media. It is my suggestion.