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A
s a result of the growing size of
Muslim community in Rolla, the
need for a new place of worship
that could accommodate the current
and future needs of the Muslim community
became clear to everyone. Many
meetings were held to brainstorm and to
come up with a viable development plan to
build a Mosque that could accommodate
the growing community needs. In the final
analysis, there were two options; expend the
old Mosque, or build a new Mosque. Though
building a new Mosque would present a
bigger challenge in terms of finding location
buying the land and financial resources,
the Muslim community of Rolla decided to
go ahead and build a new Mosque because
the community felt that the other option of
expending the old building would not meet
need. The first task for the Muslim community
of Rolla was to put in place a credible plan
with tangible goals and benchmarks for building
the new Mosque. Shortly, two committees
were established; the Mosque Planning
and Construction Committee (MPCC) and the
Fundraising Committee (FRC), each committee
was assigned with specific duties responsibilities.
The first task of the newly formed MPCC was
to find suitable land that was affordable,
close to the old Mosque or at least not far
from the University campus since most of the
congregations were students. With the help
of Almighty God, MPCC was able to find and
purchase the land adjacent to the old masjid.
In May 2007 the house that was neighboring
to the old Mosque with two other houses
within the same block became available for
sale in the market and the MPCC quickly purchased
it, and initiated the process of building
the new Mosque. By 2009, the two houses
purchased were demolished to prepare the
ground for the new Mosque.
The second phase was to come up with the
architectural design for the new Mosque,
and the committee members decided to visit
nearby Islamic Centers such as the one in
Columbia and St. Louis, MO, to observe what
type of architectural design would be appropriate
for the new Rolla Mosque. After exploring
several designs, the committee settled on
a new design for the Mosque.
April 16th, 2010 was a memorable day for
the Muslim community of Rolla because it
was the ground breaking day for the new
mosque, and as a joyful occasion, many members
of the community wanted to become
the first ones to “shovel the first dirt” out of
the ground. The action has a symbolic meaning
in the Islamic Culture. Once the construction
of the new mosque was started, and the
foundation part was completed, the need
for procuring needed construction materials
become a big challenge. The, MPCC committee
had to continue to build the new mosque
while the FRC committee was raising fund to
cover the cost of construction. Even though
budget was tight, with the help of Almighty
God and the sound financial decisions of
the committees, the construction of the new
mosque proceeded smoothly and according
to plan.
The third phase was to put insulation, electrical
systems, plumbing, exterior masonry and
concrete work within the mosque parameters.
However, the funds available at the time
were not enough to cover all the expenses
and the FRC committee decided to double its
fundraising effort in order to come up with
the needed funds.
The fourth phase of the new mosque was
interior design such as painting, carpeting
and decoration, and installation of toilets
and a kitchen that was big enough to accommodate
community-cooking events like the
Ramadan iftar or Eid celebration. In order
to reduce cost, the community members
decided to do some of the work themselves
as volunteers. Volunteers did tasks such as
painting and some portion of interior design.
Planning and
Construction of
Current ICRM
Building
By: Mohammed Debree
Working on the exterior and the walls of the ICRM
building
Starting work on the current ICRM building
Breaking ground sermony, MPCC committee
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