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Malcolm X's Former Mosque Promotes Interfaith Ties
Imam Izak-EL M. Pasha in the prayer room at Masjid Malcolm Shabazz. (Keith Bedford for The Wall Street Journal)
Institution Once Known for Black Separatism Also Focuses on Economic Development in Harlem
Aug. 10, 2014 10:18 p.m. ET
By Will Huntsberry
Masjid Malcolm Shabazz has been a center of African-American Muslim life in Harlem since Malcolm X began preaching there in 1956.
But gone are the mosque's politics of Black Nationalism, its rule that white people aren't allowed inside and its legions of followers in suits and bow ties.
Today, the mosqueits green dome overlooks West 116th Street and Malcolm X Boulevardis an interfaith pillar open to different races and religions.
When the facade of a nearby Christian church collapsed, for example, its congregation held weekly services at the mosque. A Jewish group without a synagogue now gathers there, too.
http://online.wsj.com/articles/malcolm-xs-former-mosque-now-promotes-interfaith-ties-1407723504
okasha
(11,573 posts)Fortinbras Armstrong
(4,473 posts)After Malcolm X made the Haj, he became a Sunni and forsook separatism.
Union Scribe
(7,099 posts)was when I visited a local mosque while doing a paper in college about the imam there. The spirit of interfaith fellowship is dear to me, and very few things raise my mood like reading about things like this.