A Look At The Most Progressive And Women Friendly Mosques In The World

A Pune based couple filed a plea in the supreme court asking for women’s entry in the mosque, which for now, is not allowed. The couple wants the practice of prohibiting women from entering the mosque as illegal and unconstitutional. The petitioners have added that the life of dignity and equality is the most sacrosanct fundamental right. While the women in the country are fighting for their right to enter the mosque, we bring to you some progressive mosques with no such ban on women and exhibiting some unique features too!

Ibn Rushd – Goethe Mosque

If you think of a mosque that is progressive and propagates the Islam that is compatible with human rights and democracy, it is Ibn Rushd-Goethe Mosque, in MullerStrasse, Berlin. They encourage the Islamic practices where men and women are equal, and there’s no distinction between any human being. Interestingly, they also have no prohibition for LGBTQ  Muslims, in trying to provide them a place of spiritual security.

Inclusive Jummah In UK

So as the name suggests, this initiative is to encourage inclusive Islamism. This also aims at creating worshipping place for marginalised communities. "We will not discriminate against anyone, they can be Sunni or Shia, straight or gay, people with families and people without," coordinator Tamsila Tauqir said, according to the BBC.

Toronto Unity Mosque- The Name Speaks Itself!

El Tawhid Jumma Circle, was started by a group of people who wanted to encourage love and harmony in the society. It is truly a progressive mosque. This is a place where diversity is celebrated and women enjoy equal rights as men. The LGBTQ community is included as well. As its founders say, “To exclude the female voice from the chorus of our collective narrative is to silence more than half of the collective stories of the human race.” Also, the mosque arranges prayers every Friday and anyone can attend it. Additionally, there’s no dress code too!

The Women’s Mosque Of America

Such an amazing initiative! The Women’s Mosque Of America focuses on empowering women and girls by providing them with scholarships and leadership opportunities. It also allows them to actively engage with the muslim ummah. It also provides a Friday prayer called Jummah which is women led and is for women and children (boys of 12 years and below), once a month in Southern California. Additionally, it also provides programmes , events, classes to both men and women who aim to increase awareness and knowledge among the female Muslim scholars and female perspectives on Islamic knowledge and spirituality. This is the kind of progressive mosques society needs today.

Mariam Mosque-Denmark

The Friday prayer in Mariam Mosque is reserved for women only. The organization FEMINAM was launched in 2015 to advocate the inclusion of women functioning as Imams in Denmark. Later, in 2016, FEMINAM launched the first Mosque with women imams performing Islamic rituals. The most brilliant feature of Mariam Mosque is that it challenges patriarchal beliefs in education and society and therefore assigns women imams to perform all the religious ceremonies. Men are welcome to come and pray, but only women lead the prayer.

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Picture Credit: AHMAD AZWAN AZMAN on Unsplash

Anushika Srivastava is an Intern with SheThePeople.TV