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While Friday afternoons hold a variety of activities for students to choose from, such as attending a sporting event, hanging out with friends, or relaxing after a stressful week of tests and quizzes, the members of MSA (Muslim Student Association) choose to pray the Jummah prayer together in the library classroom.
Jummah prayer is different from the five daily prayers Muslims are required to do, as it is shorter and only done on Fridays. It can serve as a replacement for the second prayer of the day and attendance is mandatory for men but optional for women.
“[These meetings] are for us to come together to have fun, for it to be like a safe space for us to voice our opinions and for having a discussion,” Racky Barry, ‘24, president of MSA, said. “It allows for girls that want to pray the Jummah prayer [to] actually pray and not feel scrutinized for that.”
As people start to arrive, the members that get there first prepare the room to be a suitable place to pray in. The tables get moved to the edges of the classroom and prayer mats are laid down in the middle.
“There are different points that your body touches to the ground when you pray: your hands, your forehead, your nose, your knees and your toes,” Barry said. “Usually, you’d want to have something on top of the ground to keep where you pray clean, just out of respect for God.”
Before they start praying, they begin with an opening sermon called a khutbah.
“It’s [khutbah] a reminder of something simple, like be nice, be good to people even if you don’t know them,” Anas Farrag, ‘25, vice president of MSA, said. “It’s like a quick message that might help you in that moment.”
With the members’ busy lives, having these meetings provides a convenient opportunity to practice their religion.
“Praying later makes it feel [harder] because you just have to get through them or you don’t pray them [at all], which [is] not optimal either,” Farrag said.
These Friday meetings also create a carefree environment that makes the prayer something to look forward to.
“In this religion, I might not be able to do the things that other people consider fun, but for me, being here, being in that space, praying with them on Fridays, laughing with them, joking with them, talking with them about our days, makes it enjoyable,” Barry said. “It makes it easier to practice your religion because you’re having fun.”
Having the service at WHHS is another factor that changes the prayer experience.
“Mosques are usually a lot more crowded,” Farrag said. “The environment is different. There’s a lot more people there and a lot less people that I personally know, so at Walnut it’s more of a community thing.”
One of MSA’s goals for the future is to have a designated prayer room that can be accessible to all students. Last year, members of MSA asked the school admin for a prayer room, but their request was denied due to a lack of space in the building.
“We tried several times to get a room just for praying and I think we’re still going to try to get a room, not just for Muslim students, but for everyone so that there’s a room for spirituality if people want to use it,” Farrag said.
However, MSA has provided even more than just offering times of prayer for the muslim community, it has allowed them to have a safe place where they can be themselves and express their religion freely.
“I feel like MSA is probably the one place where I’ve made a bunch of friends that I connect with based on culture and religion, which is very important to me,” Barry said. “I think it is really important to have people around you that understand you and also getting a chance to create that space for other children is important to me too.”
Barry hopes to continue educating the student body about Islam and also introduce non-muslims to the club.
“I feel like most people when they hear the name [MSA], they’re like that’s just for Muslims,” Barry said, “but we want everyone to come because we want everyone to know what the religion is and how we actually practice it instead of perpetuating those stereotypes about Muslims.”
