During the 52nd ISNA Convention, a key topic that was discussed was Mosque Governance and how the Mosque can be improved.
On the panel was experts in the Mosque arena, which included Imam Muhammad Mursi, the president of the Islamic Society of Central Florida.
As well as being the president of the ISOC of Florida, he oversees six other Mosques.
Imam Mursi is a well educated Imam who does a lot of outreach work in Florida and the rest of America.
The role of the Mosque is vast, during the panel discussion on the governance side, Imam Mursi believed the Mosque should be run like a business. A Mosque has all the departments a business has; finance, customer service and project planning.
Historically the Imam is the focal point of the Mosque and runs the Mosque himself, in today’s society Imams lack the training to run a Mosque and fulfil their required responsibilities, “Imams lack the basic training to be able to run a Mosque”, Mursi said.
“When I hire an Imam, I send him for all the training he needs at the beginning to ensure he is able to do the job required” he said.
The education factor was greatly emphasised by the Imam and the rest of the panel, “Imams need to have either a business, accounting, management, customer service degrees to be able to run a Mosque efficiently, more Imams need higher education”.
In regards to the general running of a Mosque, with his dedication to outreach work, Imam Mursi encouraged all Mosques to open their doors to their non-Muslim neighbours, media, law enforcement to see the Mosque and highlight the positive work that happens inside.
We are in the digital era, most businesses hold a strong emphasis on social media & website activity in promoting the work being done. Mosques should not be excluded from this, “Social media is a very powerful tool, the Mosque should have a presence online” Imam Mursi said.
The phrase ‘new generation of leadership’ was brought up consistently during this panel, it is clear to see from the thoughts of Imam Mursi & co, Imams need to improve as well as the Mosques by education and training.
