Katara Blue Mosque: A big attraction for non-Muslim visitors
AMONG the many attractions at the Cultural Village Foundation (Katara), the Great Katara Mosque (Blue Mosque) has always been a centre of attraction. Even the non-Muslim foreigners are so curious that many of them enter the courtyard of the mosque and take souvenir photos.
The Katara has seen thousands of visitors each day, having lined up hundreds of art, culture and entertainment activities coinciding with FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022.
The Katara has set up a lounge near the mosque which also has a sign put up which says: “Ask me about women in Qatar”. At the lunge, foreign women visitors can sit and drink tea and coffee, and learn about social life in Qatar with a number of volunteers answering their queries.
Volunteer Umm Ahmed said: “The aim of preparing this place near the mosque is to introduce foreigners to the Qatari culture of clothing, food and drink, customs and traditions, and most of their questions are about social relations of the Qatari family and marriage traditions. Their social questions are mostly on the life of a Muslim based on Islamic values. Many of the visitors admit that their view of Islam and Muslims was tainted by a lot of unjustified prejudice, but being in Qatar has helped change their views a hundred and eighty degrees.”
At the entrance to the mosque, there are employees and preachers from the Qatar Guests Center for Introducing Islam of the Eid Charitable Foundation. They receive nonMuslims and answer their questions and inquiries about the mosque. They also organize their entry to the mosque after prayers for people to get to know the inside atmosphere of a mosque.
Muhammad Saber, supervisor of the Department of Introducing Islam at the Qatar Guests Center, said that the centre offers the “mosque tourism” event for non-Muslim foreigners, given that the mosque is the entrance to Islamic culture, and by answering visitors’ inquiries they can reach the correct picture of Islam. There are volunteers who speak between 8 and 10 languages, enabling them to interact with the visitors and introduce them to our Islamic culture, of which the mosque is the backbone.