I cannot believe
Maimunah and I had plans for dinner at Cafe Lily in Decatur tonight. She had things she needed to do first, so we planned on meeting around 7:30ish. Since I was coming from work, I figured I’d stop by Masjid Al-Farooq* to pray ‘asr rather than doing it at work because why pray in a “quiet room” when you can pray in a musallah?
When I got to Al-Farooq, there were cars everywhere, which was odd because normally people don’t come to the masjid in between jamaats unless there’s something going on, and as far as I knew, nothing was going on. I didn’t see any women, but that’s not too unusual at Al-Farooq. The men were all staring at me as I drove in, but then, that’s not too unusual at Al-Farooq either. I didn’t really care because I was going to be there for all of ten minutes; I’d slip into the women’s section, pray my ‘asr, and slip right out.
Except they wouldn’t let me in. The first man wouldn’t let me park, and then as I was trying to understand exactly what was going on, another man told me there was “no space” for women. They were having an ijtimah, and women were not invited. I said all I wanted to do was pray, and if I didn’t do it here, I’d miss it, and he said there was no room. I’d switched into Urdu at this point because this man was more fluent in that language than in English; I don’t know what a non-Urdu speaking woman would have done in the same situation. I asked how they could not let me in for five minutes to pray, and he seemed to falter, but then he said they’d taken down all the curtains, so there was nowhere for me to pray.
At that point, I gave up, half in tears, and drove away. Situations like this usually make me angry instead of weepy, but there’s something very hopeless about being locked out of your own place of worship simply because of your gender.
The Islamic Society of Augusta isn’t fancy, but at least it’s welcoming.
I know many of the Atlanta Muslim community leaders scoff at the masjid in Augusta for being “too modern” or “too liberal” or too whatever, but I also know that something like this would never have happened in Augusta. The women would have been invited to the ijtimah in the first place, and even if none had shown up, the men would have let me in and let me pray because that’s the kind of masjid we have in Augusta: one where the actual Islam of it all comes first.
In February, I was wondering how the Prophet (S) would have reacted to the Dutch cartoons. Today I am wondering how he would have reacted if I had come to his masjid in Medina for prayer, and the men had some kind of session going on. I think I know, and I think it would not at all be like the men at Al-Farooq tonight.
Mansoor tells a story about a man who wanted to convert to Islam, but he didn’t want to do wudu. The shaykh he asked told him okay, convert, and don’t do wudu. So the man accepts Islam, and one day he goes to the masjid for prayer, but he doesn’t do wudu. Another man in the masjid is horrified and says that he must do wudu, that he cannot pray without wudu. The first man gets upset and leaves, saying if he has to do wudu, he’s not going to be Muslim. The second man then goes to the shaykh and asks him how he could possibly tell the first man that he didn’t have to do wudu because it’s not true as wudu is an important part of the religion. The shaykh said, “At least I got him to step towards Islam. You just drove him away.”
Tonight, Al-Farooq drove me away. If I had any other options for a downtown masjid, I would never go back, but Al-Farooq is the only one on my way home from work right now, and I refuse to stop going to the masjid simply because some people think it’s okay to kick the women out on certain days. If their Web site were working (and yes, I know I linked to it above, but that’s mostly for the future when it IS working, and while I’m on that note, why, exactly does a regime change on the board entail downtime for the Web site? Couldn’t they have just left the old one up while they did the new one?), I’d have looked up the President’s name and email address by now, but since it’s not, I’m going to have to work a little harder to find it. This kind of thing is NOT okay. It’s not. And while I hesitate to ever channel Asra Nomani, I can’t just let it go.
Update Sunday, June 4: I asked Mansoor yesterday, and he said it was Tabliqi Jammat who was there Friday afternoon, so at least it makes sense now… but it’s still not okay. It does, however, make me even more glad I didn’t marry that guy from the Tabliqi family way back when.