Tuesday, November 10, 2009

Mosque


Well today we had the chance to go to a Muslim Mosque. It was very interesting. We sarted off the day walking through Regents park towards the mosque.  It is hte central mosque for London and it is pretty big. It is big building with a gold dome on top. When we go there we were met by our guide Omar.  He is a 24-year-old and he seems very accomplished for his age.  He travels all around the UK teaching to universities and other groups all about Islam. He has been to Mecca twice and he has also written literature about Islam for people learning about it. We started out tour in the big chapel area where Omar taught us a little about the prayers they say.  We watched them do their prayers and it was really neat.  They line up in straight line and go through this procession of bows.  They do this 5 times a day.  The procession starts with a cal to prayer and then them opening the prayer by a simple gesture and they go though the bows a certain amount of times depending on the prayer then they can pray about whatever they want followed by a closing of the prayer. The person leading all of this is called an Imam and they are like priests that have to go through certain amounts of training and they have to memorize large parts if not all the Qur'an,  He said there are Imam's as young as 10 who lead entire congregations because they are qualified.  We then headed upstairs so he could teach us more about the religion.  He explained that Mosques were only considered mosques if they have some type of library.  It doesn’t have to be anything extravagant just some place there are books you can study from.  He told us about his trips to mecca and the type of things you do there.  He showed us a couple of pictures and told us about the actual building they go to to pray in. It was amazing to see so many people devoted to that faith and hear the stories of Muhammad, peace be upon him.  He also told us about the prophet Muhammad and the start of religion including the marriage between him and his wife.  I really liked that story. He talked about the 5 pillars of their religion. I really enjoyed learning about the Mosque.  Omar was a great guide and answered all of our questions.  I feel like a better person for learning more about their religion.

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