Greening Our Community - The Huddersfield Eco-Mosque Goals

Our local Huddersfield mosque called Anware Madina is one of the few taking a pledge to green up the community, insha-Allah (God willing). These are our goals - please make du`a' (supplication) we achieve them!

There are only a handful of 'greener' mosques in Britain, and I don't want to discredit them - they are wonderful! In Yorkshire, the north of England, hundreds of mosques have facilities for parking bikes, shared allotments and gardens and even water saving initiatives.

+ Check out Manchester Muslim Environmentalists' allotments.

However, our Anware Madina mosque in West Yorkshire may be just one of the few in the whole of Britain that has taken a pledge to green up its actual educational curriculum. This means that in addition to teaching children skills in Qur'an and Ahadith, we are educating them to become eco-ambassadors in their own lives.

There is much to do in terms of making eco-Islam resources like worksheets and outdoor gardening workshops. Alhamdulillah (all praise belongs to God), we have also achieved muchly much in the last few months (I'm trying to be positive!)

Our Teaching Staff
In our madrassa I am the eco-Islam teacher among five female teachers. My sister is teaching Islamic studies to girls aged 11-16 (the 5 pillars of Islam, 7 beliefs, Qur'an Tafsir, Seerah, Jihad etc), and the other teachers help the younger students complete their Qur'an recitation.

I had the opportunity to meet up with the MADE in Europe team, a Muslim campaigning organisation with green roots in London, who helped me structure our mosque goals. Insha-Allah, when we have achieved these goals and I have certainty our community is committed to keeping them, a Green Mosque Guide will be published for mosques worldwide to utilise.

The Huddersfield Eco-Mosque Goals
To date I have informed our students' parents of our goals and we have recorded our progress on The Eco Muslim website: follow The Hudderfield Eco-Mosque posts.

The Green Up My Community pledge

Our goal is to teach students 5 lessons from Islam's environmental principles

1. To recycle and reuse a greater portion of our trash bin contents at home and mosque 
2. To save water when making Ghusl (bath), making Wudhu (ablutions) and in general
3. To learn how to plant and grow fruit, vegetables and herbs to become a little more self-sufficient
4. To reduce our food waste in general so that we are buying less and eating less and we are thankful for our provisions
5. To raise awareness about ethical consumerism when shopping for clothes, buying food and meat, following Fairtrade ideas and understanding Islamic business in general

Our class has partially met some of these goals but we are going to display these boldly in our classroom so we all know what we're aiming for. I will keep you appraised as to how we achieve these goals. PLEASE make du`a' that we reach them all!

Peace + eco-jihad.
Zaufishan, The Eco Muslim