Your Mosque at the Centre of the Community. Welcome Home!

Once the leadership of Symons Valley United Church decided on the mission statement for the congregation in 2013, they worked to distill the mission statement into a succinct vision statement that would, in one or two sentences, convey to the world what their faith community was all about. Having recently moved to a newly developed area by the city of Calgary, they wanted the people who live all around the church to know that their doors were open for all people, no matter where they are in their faith journeys, their history with or without a church and no matter who they loved or who loved them. Being an affirming congregation in the United Church of Canada, it is important to the congregation that it is widely known all people, seeking to better know God and to follow the teachings of Jesus, are welcome to attend and join this community of faith. And so, after some deliberation, this became Symons Valley United Church's vision statement:

Your Church at the Centre of the Community. Welcome Home!

Since the doors opened at SVUC, the Al Makkah Prayer Group from the Al Madinah Calgary Islamic Assembly, have prayed their Friday prayers in the hall of the church. In late 2016, the Prayer Group became too big to use just the hall. The men now meet in the sanctuary and the women meet in the hall. Imam Syed Soharwardy, the founder and president of the Islamic Supreme Council of Canada, tells us that this is the only instance that he is aware of in the world in which Muslims pray in the primary worship space used by Christians.

Over the years the leadership from both faith communities have met together for meals and socializing. Just before I began serving SVUC, the congregation and prayer group worked together to have a Sunday inter-faith worship service. Syed offered the message that Sunday.

The history and relationship between the Christians and Muslims who both pray in SVUC is deep and rich. In my time with the congregation, our relationship has deepened and become focused on the two communities coming together in family friendly gatherings to share meals (of course!) and have facilitated conversations about our different faith traditions, rituals and scriptures. And, in light of the fact that both streams of faith descend from Abraham, the Father of Judaism, Christianity and Islam, we also share what is similar between our two religions and our shared histories.

Shahid blessing the congregation

This past Sunday, January 15th, we once again invited a leader from the Muslim community to join us in our worship service. We truly believe that we are brothers and sisters in faith with the Muslims who enter the church each Friday, who respectfully remove their shoes at the front entrance and who listen to the word of Allah (God) and say their prayers while facing Mecca. And so, we asked Imam Shahid Bashir to tell us the rest of the story of Ishmael, the first born son of Abraham. Shahid, his spouse and several members of his faith community joined us for the service. Shahid spoke during the message time and then, at the end of the worship service, blessed the congregation with the blessing he uses at the end of the prayer time on Fridays. He spoke it first in Arabic and then translated it into English.

In the Bible, we pretty much lose touch with Ishmael once Abraham banishes Ishmael and his mother, Hagar, out to the desert. Shahid told us the story of Ishmael and Hagar and how their actions following Abraham's abandonment of them, is the basis of the different components that make up the Hajj (Pilgrimage) to Mecca that each Muslim is required to make at least once in their lifetime. It was fascinating to hear about the ongoing life story of a relatively minor character in the Bible. Ishmael and his mother served a purpose in the realizing of God's promise to Abraham that he would have as many descendants as stars in the sky. However, once Ishmael's purpose no longer propels the story of the creation Israel, his character is dismissed. And yet, we are taught that he is the Father of

Scot Middleton thanking Shahid

Islam. So, something significant must have happened once his mother and him survived the desert. And now, thanks to Shahid, we know.

Scot Middleton, the Chair of the SVUC Board, thanked Shahid at the end of the service. Scot reminded the congregation, Shahid and his Muslims sitting with us, that Symons Valley United Church feels strongly that, as much as we are the Church at the centre of the community, so is the building:

Your Mosque at the Centre of the Community. Welcome Home!