A Lively Experiment
A Multireligious Historical Overview of Rhode Island
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| According to the research of Omar Haque, the post-1965 immigration also brought to Rhode Island many Muslims from west, south, and southeast Asia. During the late 1960s and 70s, they met at the University of Rhode Island's student union to pray, celebrate holy days, and share community. They would also travel to the more established Islamic Center of New England located in Quincy, Massachusetts. By 1975, the Rhode Island community had grown sufficiently to begin planning for a permanent Islamic center of its own. In July of 1976, the first meeting of the Islamic Center of Rhode Island was held at the International House of Rhode Island, and about eighty members joined. Four months later, with the advice, financial support, and encouragement of the wider New England Muslim community, they purchased a funeral home on Providence's South Side and converted it into a mosque. Also called Masjid al-Karim, the center is now barely able to contain its expanding congregation. The community has arranged with local public schools to release Muslim students for Friday prayers, it maintains a halal market and chaplaincies at Rhode Island Hospital and the Adult Correctional Institution, and it hopes someday to open an Islamic school. |
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