Thread: Private Masjid Ownership
Say the Masjid is doing a great job. It's just that some guy owns the place.
Say a Masjid has amazing programing and is a wonderful place to bring your family in Ramadan and throughout the year. The only thing is that it is a nonprofit that solicits donations, controlled by the same person who privately owns the property the Masjid sits on.
What if there is no nonprofit, just someone who opens their property up as a Masjid through his generosity as a property owner?
How would you approach this issue when it comes to your donation? If they are doing a good job and you pray there, does it matter? I would love to know your thoughts.
In Surah Taubah Allah says (translation)
"There are also those ˹hypocrites˺ who set up a mosque ˹only˺ to cause harm, promote disbelief, divide the believers, and as a base for those who had previously fought against Allah and His Messenger.1 They will definitely swear, “We intended nothing but good,” but Allah bears witness that they are surely liars.
Do not ˹O Prophet˺ ever pray in it. Certainly, a mosque founded on righteousness from the first day is more worthy of your prayers. In it are men who love to be purified.1 And Allah loves those who purify themselves
Which is better: those who laid the foundation of their building on the fear and pleasure of Allah, or those who did so on the edge of a crumbling cliff that tumbled down with them into the Fire of Hell? And Allah does not guide the wrongdoing people. 107-110
This clearly tells that THE criteria for mosque is 'TAQWA, rest can be sorted.
There's a masjid near me that has an opaque ownership structure (unclear if it's a nonprofit, privately owned, etc.), and it's run by the same small group of people, all of one ethnicity, who founded it a few decades ago. There's no elections, no committees, no real way to get involved.
It used to be a great masjid, with great programming, events, children's classes, dynamic imam. We loved going there.
Then things took a turn for the worse and now there's basically no programming, no events, no imam, not even a functioning website. The community has gotten much more diverse in the meantime (the original ethnic group is a minority in the masjid now), but it's still being run by the same people, some of whom don't even come regularly outside of jummah.
I pitch in a few dollars here and there because they're providing a place to pray, but I would never make a significant donation.
I guess this doesn't directly answer your question because it's not a great masjid currently, but my larger point is that if a masjid is unaccountable to the community, it might be great now, but it could nosedive and there'll be nothing you can do about it, so decide your donations accordingly.