Mosques 'fail to tackle radicals'

[Uthman]

The UK's mosques are out of touch with British Muslims and failing to root out extremism, a think tank has claimed.

The Quilliam Foundation, a group which opposes radical Islam, quotes a study saying 97% of imams were born abroad.

It says the lecture before Friday prayers in 44% of mosques is not in English, while nearly half have no women's facilities.

The Mosques and Imams National Advisory Board said the problem lay with outside groups "grooming" young Muslims.

Quilliam Foundation director, Maajid Nawaz, said the findings showed mosques lacked the "resilience to challenge Islamist extremists".

He described the statistics as "deeply disturbing", and warned that extremism could not be tackled while imams - mosques' religious preachers and educators - were "physically in Britain, but psychologically in Pakistan or Bangladesh".

He added: "Our first line of defence against terrorism is the ability, commitment, and confidence of mosques and Muslim communities to root out extremism.

"Currently, we are failing."

'Signs of hope'

The bulk of our youth, they don't seek advice from imams, they seek advice elsewhere

Seyyed Ferjani
Mosques and Imams National Advisory Board

The report argues that although mosques provide a range of services to their communities, many are led by a socially conservative older generation, out of touch with young British Muslims.

It says many foreign imams are low-paid and have limited proficiency in English, putting them at the mercy of management committees dominated by first-generation elders.

As a result, the Foundation says, imams are unable to reach out to young Muslims with "a British Islam informed by British values" - giving extremists the "upper hand".

The report's author, Anya Hart Dyke, said there were "signs of hope", however, with many mosques involving women and young people in their governance, sharing space with community organisations and opening their doors to non-Muslims.

"This needs to become the norm amongst our mosques," she said.

Educational programmes

Seyyed Ferjani, chair of the Mosques and Imams National Advisory Board, told BBC Radio 4's Today programme there was a problem in the mosques, but not to the scale the report suggested.

"The imam in the mosque only leads prayers. We have a problem in our mosques that most, the bulk of our youth, they don't seek advice from imams, they seek advice elsewhere.

"And the problem that we've got, like the people who are in Leeds and elsewhere and groups here, they are outside of mosques, who are grooming them."

The Quilliam Foundation report comes the day after a Charity Commission study found mosques provided a range of community activities.

The Charity Commission study of 255 mosques in England and Wales was conducted by by BMG Research.

It found 94%, of mosques delivered educational programmes for children and young people, while 82% carry out fundraising for the relief of poverty and hardship.

The survey found 61% carry out women's groups and activities, while 47% deliver sports and leisure activities, and 31% organise activities for senior citizens.

Source

[Uthman]

One valid point that I think the article points out is that there are a significant amount of Imaams who have a less than desirable command of the English language (putting it politely). At my local mosque, the Khutbahs aren't in English which renders them pretty much of no value or benefit to me. Luckily, in my case, I have enough knowledge of Islam to keep me from going off track but the same can't be said of lots of other youths which the Imaams are failing to engage.

However, I am slightly dubious regarding the supposed effect this has on radicalisation of young people as I think that would be oversimplifying the issue just a little bit. I don't think there is any significant evidence that this is in any way linked to Muslim youth becoming radicalised by 'extremists' and is little more than an assumption.

Btw here is a link to the wikipedia article on the Quilliam Foundation, the think-tank which came up with this report. Interestingly, it is set up and run by Muslims.

[Uthman]

Comment by Andrew Brown:

Islam in Britain: not very C of E

A report out today laments the high numbers of foreign-trained leaders of UK mosques. But is making imams more like vicars the solution?

The Quilliam Foundation is an interesting body because it hopes to achieve a more Muslim Britain as much as any of the Islamist parties it criticises; but it means to get there by fair means rather than foul. The headline that comes out of its latest report (pdf) is that almost all the imams in British mosques are foreign.

The figure they actually cite, of 97%, is not entirely to be trusted. It is based on the responses of 254 of Britain's estimated 1200 mosques; the foundation tried to reach over 1000 of them with a list of five questions, but only 512 answered at all and of these 254 answered the one about the imam's birthplace; and only 152 told them where the imam had been trained. The picture of British mosques as secretive and hard for outsiders to reach is reinforced by others' experience: the Charity Commission estimates that it takes on average 12 attempts to reach one.

Compare and contrast Christian churches, where this sort of information is pretty freely available. Usually, they will put the names and phone numbers of their staff on a conspicuous board outside; and at least in protestant denominations it is not uncommon to boast of their educational attainments as well.

There is a paradox here. Muslims claim, and Christians fear, that their religion is growing fast, and not entirely by demographics. Abdul Hakim Murad, a Cambridge don who used to be known as Tim Winter, has said that there are twice as many imams in training in Britain as there are candidates for the Christian priesthood. But the picture that this report paints is one of small, sectarian and chauvinist groupuscules, reproducing in this country the fissiparous and distrustful community loyalties of the subcontinent. They are not in the least interested in reaching out to the community around them. In fact they have limited interest in reaching English speakers at all: nearly half don't deliver the lecture before Friday prayers in English.

Curiously, the thing that this reminds me of is the pattern of early Christianisation of Europe in the Dark Ages, when the first missionary bishops were sent out beyond the shrinking boundaries of the Christian Roman empire not to convert but to look after the needs of the Christians already living there, who had found themselves under barbarian overlords. Immigrants formed the majority of British Muslims as recently as 2001. I don't think they want the rather Anglican model of clergy that Quilliam proposes.

The Quilliam report wants British Muslims to learn from the practices of the Church of England and the Baptists. The thinktank is, I suspect, turning into the Tablet of Islam; admirable, civilised, but not very influential. It is all very well to want a professionalised clergy, equipped with gadgets like "An 'excellence in mosques' capacity-building CD toolkit as part of its Leadership Development programme" but there doesn't seem much demand for such developed leaders (with or without distinguishing Capital Letters) outside of the thinktank. In the end, this looks like nothing so much as old-fashioned orthodox English Judaism, with its strong emphasis on respectability. Some of the older rabbis in that tradition even, I believe, wore dog collars to symbolise their clerical status. How long before an imam is spotted doing the same?

Source

[Uthman]

Comment by George Pitcher:

We have to mix with Muslims too

Research from the Quilliam Foundation has found that some 97 per cent of imams in Britain were not born here and 44 per cent of lectures before Friday prayers in mosques are not in English.

There are many Anglican churchgoers who might claim that a higher percentage of sermons that they hear are not in English either. But no matter. These statistics must be taken seriously, their point being that, as Quilliam puts it, imams in British mosques are "physically in Britain, but psychologically in Pakistan or Bangladesh". It follows, for some, that British Muslims, particularly the young, are vulnerable to radicalisation as "outsiders" - not by the imams, necessarily, but by others who get to them socially or in their places of education.

The problem I have is that I have yet to meet a British Muslim who exemplifies this problem. I hear plenty of non-Muslim voices saying they are "sick and tired" of Muslims getting special treatment. This usually turns out to be Christmas being re-named "Winterval" or something by some stupid local council. But that's not driven by Muslims; it's driven by secularists.

These same voices will say I'm protected by living in middle-class, "wasp" enclaves. But that's not true either; I am indeed middle-class, but we brought up our children for 23 years in south-east London in a very ethnically and economically diverse community and the children went to local schools with Muslims of all social strata, we sat on committees with them, we travelled on public transport with Muslim families, visited Muslim neighbours' homes, shopped in Muslim shops and, yes, visited their mosques. Plenty of Muslims I've lived alongside are irritating or boring, just as non-Muslims are. But never have I come up against this "non-British" problem.

I'm not saying there isn't a problem. Quilliam's statistics are alarming. They point to a dangerous lack of assimilation of an immigrant population in this country, just as we had with Ugandans fleeing Idi Amin in the 70s. What they don't suggest to me is a simmering pot of anti-British dissent, about to burst into a jihadist revolution.

What we need to address is assimilation, not some fight against Islamism. Imams - leaders of prayer, not "priests" - clearly need to recognise where they and those to whom they lecture actually live. That's about nationality and geography not religion. And "ordinary" Muslims need to speak up for what their lives are really like in Britain, so that we don't collectively run away with some silly notion that they are an enemy within. And the rest of us have to look at how well we're engaged with British Muslims who live around us, to ensure that we're not just pointing our fingers at people that we alienate in our own nation.

Yes, Muslims have a responsibility to assimilate in British society. But so does everyone else.

Source

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[Uthman]

Comment by Ed Husain (co-founder of the Quilliam Foundation).

[Far7an]

Research from the Quilliam Foundation has found that some 97 per cent of imams in Britain were not born here and 44 per cent of lectures before Friday prayers in mosques are not in English.

If the first statistic about 97% of Imaams being born outside of UK had been published 10 years ago, I'd have probably accepted it. However, I'd have to question what methods they used to conduct this research if this is the result they achieved!

With regards to the lectures/khutbahs being delivered in other languages, it's true that they are not always in English, many of the masaajid look to the cater for the locality. Sometimes in order to get through to the majority of the congregation as effectively as possible, the lectures are delivered in other languages. However, in my experiences I've found that many masaajid are open to suggestion and if they were approached they would like to cater for the English only speaking audiences. In our city there are a few masaajid which alternate between Urdu and English on a week to week basis.

[Uthman]

:sl: Far7an!

If the first statistic about 97% of Imaams being born outside of UK had been published 10 years ago, I'd have probably accepted it. However, I'd have to question what methods they used to conduct this research if this is the result they achieved!

Indeed. If you look to the article in my second post, it explains why the 97% figure is probably inaccurate.

With regards to the lectures/khutbahs being delivered in other languages, it's true that they are not always in English, many of the masaajid look to the cater for the locality. Sometimes in order to get through to the majority of the congregation as effectively as possible, the lectures are delivered in other languages. However, in my experiences I've found that many masaajid are open to suggestion and if they were approached they would like to cater for the English only speaking audiences. In our city there are a few masaajid which alternate between Urdu and English on a week to week basis.

Good points. Come to think of it, I do wonder how many masaajid have actually been approached about it. Maybe it's time for people like me to do a little less complaining and be a bit more pro-active.

:w:

[Uthman]

Comment by Anya Hart Dyke:

We want a more British Islam

My report on British mosques should not be read for alarming statistics, but for practical suggestions on empowering women and young people.

I have been delighted by the level of discussion generated by Quilliam Foundation's report Mosques Made in Britain across broadcast, online and "new" media and believe it complements the findings of the Charity Commission's mosques survey, also published this week. Mosques and mosque-based cultural centres can and do deliver a range of services and activities for their congregants. But there remain fundamental concerns about the quality of the religious service provided by mosques to worshippers.

Quilliam is not calling for what Andrew Brown describes as a "more Muslim Britain as much as any of the Islamist parties," but for mosques to espouse an Islam that encourages Muslims to be more British: the antithesis of the Islamist agenda which pushes a Muslim supremacist "us" (Muslims) versus "them" (non-believers) ideology.

It was no mean feat to get through to as many mosques as we did (more than 500), and to get such sensitive information on imams. The findings reinforce the experiences of many Muslims in Britain and here now is the nationwide empirical evidence to support long held assumptions, serving to strengthen the case for much needed change.

Mosques are not the only spaces in this country within which young Muslims are socialised and receive their religious education. And nor should they be. But mosques are an invaluable counterbalance to other spaces, where young Muslims learn about their faith, coloured by generational differences within the family, Christian-led religious instruction in school, fired-up radicals on university campuses, unenlightened peers, and unregulated social networking sites. Yet young (especially female) Muslims have limited access to mosques in a very real sense: 44% of Britain's mosques do not hold the Friday lecture in the English language and 46% do not have prayer facilities for women!

An additional problem is with the mosque's leadership. Imams are not necessarily uninterested in reaching out to young people but rather they may be unable owing to limited proficiency in English and a limited grasp of what life is like for young Muslims growing up in Britain. It's not that foreign imams are anti-British but rather that they may not be sufficiently pro-British that is the problem. There is a need for a religious leadership in mosques which understands and believes in the complex ways British society operates and which is able to redirect young Muslims towards the myriad ways in which citizens can both function and effect change in a multi-stakeholder British democracy.

The future of the British imam is a more pastoral one. Imams can learn from the experiences of Muslim university chaplains, but also other faiths. There are aspects of how other faith communities organise themselves and appoint, pay and train their religious leadership (if you like, the temporal aspects), which would be beneficial to the much more recently established Muslim community. Much would be gained from some of the better educated, younger, more attuned imams in this country organizing to meet with representatives from the Church of England, the Baptists and the United Synagogue's Rabbinical Council to see where lessons can be shared.

Readers should review the report's recommendations on improving religious leadership and empowering youth and women in mosque life, and not just get bogged down in the alarming statistics, for ways forward. The report's findings emboldened Hazel Blears in a speech on 25 February to renew calls for existing faith leaders in Britain to improve their pastoral and linguistic skills.

The recommendations, as well as the best practices profiled in the report, reflect a range of experiences from across the Muslim communities. I received an email earlier in the week from a Muslim youth group representative saying: "I got a lot of useful ideas from it [the report], which can help the organisation I work with and our local mosque, hopefully". These recommendations and initiatives should be built upon, tested, revised and debated. Let's keep the momentum going.

Source

Anya Hart Dyke is a senior research fellow at the Quilliam Foundation.

[Uthman]

Although the title of the above comment is slightly off-putting with it's reference to a "more British Islam", I think that, like the report, it raises some valid concerns about the level of proficiency with which Imaams can speak English and about mosque facilities for women.

One objection I do have is with regards to the "fired-up radicals on university campuses" which I think is exaggerated. Other than that, I think it would be sensible for us, the Muslim community, to recognise the great achievements and contributions of mosques and Imaams in the UK, but at the same time address some real concerns.