Is Islam really changing?
Is it giving space to the women folk?
Tucson’s largest mosque, which was completed in 1990, for the first time, has allowed women folk to pray in view of imam and other leaders.
The Tucson mosque, with about 1,000 mostly Sunni worshippers, had a long tradition of separating men and women with gender-specific entrances.
Men have used the front door to access the main worship area. Women have used a small room accessible by a side door, where they listen to the prayer leader via an audio system. The women’s room has windows, but except on special occasions, they’re covered with blinds.
In August, Ingrid Mattson became the first female president of the Islamic Society of North America. And last year, a gender-dividing wall at the Islamic Society of San Francisco was removed.
University of Arizona senior Yusra Tekbali says she appreciates the new arrangement at the mosque in Tucson, where a curtain separating the women is now partially opened.
Women are now happy with the change and with the support that they are receiving from men. After all, it’s an example of a national effort to make women more equal in mosques.
Comments
islam not changing, it is always enough , but some of muslims going as per their desire, the tuscon mosuque incidents such example.