Lucan Muslim Community

2011

Introduction
I

n Ireland we have a diverse community of Muslims. More specifically in Lucan, we represent a diverse and widespread mixture of people from all walks of life. Unfortunately, we lack the unity that would provide us with a single voice. Focused on simple issues such as providing activities for our women, men & children. To both socialise and build our communities for the better. The Lucan Muslim Community has been established to bring together people of all walks of life, who share a common beleief: peace. We base everything on one simple rule, tolerance for everyone and openess to all. We wish to be the prescence in the community to who anyone in need of advice or assistance can turn to, regardless of race, ehtnicity, gender or religion. Our goal is to unite the community an focus on what is important, building a safe, confident community that looks after itself.

Services
One of the key areas that nees addressing in our community is access to activities and bringing the community together. Sport has always played a bridging role among communities when it comes to integration and inclusion. We will be offering an array of sports & activities to encourage our youth to keep active, healthy and meet people they perhaps would not meet otherwise. The aim is to build friendships that last beyond the playing field. In the same way, academic pursuits help us learn while challenging ourselves and others at the same time. Access to resources such as a library with learning materials is crucial. We hope to indtroduce debating & reading clubs for our youth, women and men of all ages. The key to our existance is to bring things to communities that perhaps dont have access to normally. We want to offer advice and assistance as much as possible. From basic activities that bring communities together, to more elaborate get togethers that bring the entire village of Lucan together. We want to bring the Muslim community in to the overall community and participate to increase awareness and tolerance of one another. At our core, we identify that there still may be a negative perception of muslims in general. Only by us integrating properly can we dispell this and show that there are more similarities than differences between us all.

Community
A stong community is a healthy one. To build strong communities, we need to provide the building blocks for this. By looking after our women & children. Providing services that keep them active and stimulated. Themore we can bring everyone together, the better Lucan will be. When people speak of multi-culturalism, they forget that as much as there as differences, there are also many similarities. These are what we want to focus on. When the trust is built between people, it is much more likely that the differences can be tolerated and understood. The community of Lucan is so diverse that we must work to find common ground for us all to better understand each other.

Children

Young Adults

Males

Females

For the children of our community, we wish to provide activities for everyone to participate in. The main focus will be on basic Islamic education after school and general recreational activities. While our focus is on muslim children, that should not stop us involving everyone regarding the sports and clubs we want to establish. Our goal is to be inclusive of everyone and we would welcome all ideas that would benefit all the children of Lucan.

Living in a country in a where one is not considered native brings many challenges. This can be even more difficult as one goes through adolescence. Our focus with the youth of our community is to share knowledge about other communities. Interacting with everyone and providing services that keep our youth on the path of success both socially, academically and otherwise. We wish to bring clubs and activities to our young adults that build character and friendships.

For our brothers in the community, we want to encourage them to keep healthy and active. At the same time, regular meetings can be scheduled to address the issues of the day and tackle them as a community. We hope to be the ears of the people, where their problems become our own and we can assist as best we can.

Our sisters are also keen to build our community. We need to provide for them channels to express themselves. Be it dealing with community issues, offering classes and activities. Even assisting with problems and issues they may have. We will dedicate a team to be available to assist them whenever they may need us.

Islamic services
As this is a muslim community we want to provide Islamic services that are lacking in Lucan. A major issue has been a burial fund to assist those less fortunate. As a muslim, one has to be buried in a certain way, not everyone is aware of this among the greater Irish public. We would like to provide the service to handle the process should the necessity arise. Learning and discussing the Quran is important for us. We want to provide classes and discussions that talk about the many issues in Islam today. Islamic classes for beginners and even advanced students will be provided to teach our community the basics of our religiion.

Inclusive of everyone
Without our community, we are nothing. Anyone and everyone who wants to be apart of this is welcome. The only criteria is that you tolerate everyone. We want to become the vessel for a better understanding of Islam and how similar we are to everyone else. The only way to do that is involve everyone. Our approach is one of inclusion, acceptance and peace.

www.lucanmuslim.com