Hugh Kramer Murfreesboro is a growing little city of 100,000 people about 30 miles southeast of Nashville in Tennessee. Since 1997 it had a mosque and Islamic Center that serves the needs of Muslims in five counties. Like Murfreesboro, this community is growing too and in January, the Islamic Center announced it was planning to build a new, larger facility…
Recently, the Turkish community of one Munich district had to bury their plans for a new mosque. The conservative party CSU had blocked the construction for reasons of “wrong place, wrong architecture” and the lack of involvement of local neighbors. Furthermore, the initiative was proposed by an organization which has close ties to the Turkish…
Mosque and church attendance in the Netherlands has dropped over the past ten years, according to a publication from the Central Statistics Bureau (CBS) outlining religion at the beginning of the 21st century. Last year 29 percent of the Netherlands’ 825,000 Muslims attended mosque at least once a month, a decline from 35 percent in…
The German architect who designed an ambitious, if controversial, mosque in Cologne cannot wait for construction to begin in the new year so that he can watch his dream take physical shape. Paul Bohm, a 49-year-old non-practising Catholic, admits to being nervous, but proud of what he has envisioned. He has good reason. His is…
