I t was Friday. July 16, 2010, I finally decided to visit a Muslim mosque, which is located at 2542 Franklin Drive in Ft Lauderdale. Muslims major service is held every Friday at exactly 1:30 pm. The building is situated by itself on the corner of a residential neighborhood.
Upon entering the mosque, I saw about two hundred Muslims of many different ethnic backgrounds arrived there to worship.
Being of a Christian faith, I felt mortified to go into the mosque to observe these people of a totally different religion. I would not have felt this way if I was assigned to go to observe another church , which is under my religion because I would have felt more welcome there. I was standing beside my car puzzled what to do next ,but when one of the Muslim lady approached me and introduced herself to me as Rasheeda Salem . She asked me why I was there , so I told her I had a World religion assignment to do. She told me it would be ok to observe their worship, but I am not allowed to take pictures.
I had wrapped my head and put on a long sleeved shirt at home. I felt I looked appropriate enough to enter their place of worship, but to my surprise, my new acquaintance told me to wait outside, so she can get me a wrap to cover my body more , because my fitted clothes can cause the brothers to sin. Rasheedah accompanied me inside the mosque. When we arrived at the door, she put her right foot in first. She took off her shoes and I also did likewise. Standing at the entrance of the door , I notice something very strange , women and men walked through different doors to enter and exit the mosque, and what was even stranger , they did not sat in the same room to worship. I turned, and asked Rasheedah, what is the significance for the separation between the genders? She told me it is a practice put in place to eradicate distractions, for humans can be easily caught off guard when the...
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