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Muslim believers growing
Metro Detroit is home to one of the largest U.S. communities; Mosques up by
42 percent

By Kim Kozlowski / The Detroit News

    As the young community of Muslims continues to grow here and across
America, the number of mosques and participants are exploding, according to
the largest and most comprehensive survey of its kind in the United States.
Growing faith
The largest and most comprehensive survey of mosques in America was released
Thursday. Here are some highlights from "The Mosque in America: A National
Project:"
   * There are 1,209 mosques in America.
   * At the average mosque, 33 percent of the members are South Asian, 30
percent are African American and 25 percent are Arabs.
   * An average of 292 people attend a mosque every Friday for the prayer
service, an increase of 94 percent since 1994.
   * Two million Muslims in America are affiliated with a mosque, a whopping
300 percent increase since 1994.

   Released Thursday, "The Mosque in America: A National Portrait," further
shows the Muslim faith is racially diverse, and its leaders agree that
Muslims should be more involved in the political process.
   "The overall message is that Muslims are going to be a player on the
American scene," said Ihsan Bagby, an international studies professor at Shaw
University in Raleigh, N.C., and the study's lead researcher.
   "Their presence is not going away. It is going to continue to become
stronger and more vocal."
   The findings mirror trends that are unfolding in Metro Detroit, home to
one of the largest Muslim communities in America.
   In the past decade, the number of mosques in the area has grown by 42
percent, from 21 to 30, according to Imam Abdullah El-Amin, executive
director of the Council of Islamic Organizations of Michigan.
   And not all of the mosques are in Dearborn, where a sizable portion of the
Muslim community lives. Mosques are located in places such as Bloomfield
Hills, Wyandotte, Detroit and Canton.
   "It's been phenomenal around here in the Metro Detroit area," El-Amin
said. "You have so many people coming in for Friday prayers -- they're
praying out on the steps."
   To address the need, there is about $30 million worth of investment in
projects under way for building bigger mosques and expanding others.
   The Islamic Center of America, for instance, is building a $15-million
mosque on Ford Road while the Islamic Center of America in Rochester Hills is
putting up $4-million addition.
   "It does not surprise me at all," said Zana Macki, a Dearborn Heights
resident who attends the same mosque as 100 of her family members. "Religion
is strong in our community."
   And with numbers, comes power.
   Eighty-nine percent of mosques' leaders believe that Muslims should be
more involved in the political process, according to the survey, co-sponsored
by the Council for American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) and three other national
Muslim organizations. Muslims are beginning to organize here, but they still
need to form a collective voice and agenda.
   But that could prove to be a challenge because of the diversity of the
community: the average mosque is 33 percent South Asian, 30 percent African
American and 25 percent Arabic, according to the study.
   Locally, the population is skewed by the large number of Arabs, said Kay
Siblani of the Michigan CAIR office. But there is a significant population of
Indian, Pakistani, Bengali and African-American Muslims, as well as Caucasian
Americans who have converted.
   Victor Begg, who founded the local Muslim Citizens Grass Roots Political
Committee, said the group wasn't fully united when it endorsed George W. Bush
for president last year.
   Nationally, about 70 percent of Muslims voted for Bush, and he estimates
that even more voted for him locally.
   However, African-American Muslims generally voted for Al Gore and some
Muslims voted for Ralph Nader, who is of Lebanese descent.
   But Begg said the group is going to continue to organize and is already
preparing for the next election.
   "We're going to be large in numbers and we're developing a mechanism to
come together," said Begg, president of the Unity Center in Bloomfield Hills.
"I can only see that we are going to do better four years from now."

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