Mission Statement
The purposes of ISCV shall be to share and advance the teachings of Islam and to serve the Muslim community and community at large in Charlottesville, Albemarle, and surrounding counties.
History
Our Muslim Community in Charlottesville, like many others in the United States, passed through several phases. The first phase was prior to 1994. With no masjid, the small Muslim community in Charlottesville had to rent a place for prayers. A major breakthrough happened in 1994 when a Muslim brother purchased a home and rented it to the Muslim community, free of charge, for prayers. The first prayer in the masjid was in January 1995 and that place continued to be our masjid for the next 17 years. This masjid was a walking distance from most of the University facilities which made it accessible for the Muslim community. The problem with it was that we outgrew it fast.
As early as 1997, the Muslim community recognized the pressing need to move to a bigger masjid. The rapid growth of the community, exacerbated by the arrival of Muslim refugees from Bosnia, Kosovo, Afghanistan, Somalia, Sudan, and more recently from Iraq compelled the community to work harder in trying to move to a bigger space. The lack of available funding at hand made our search for an existing building in vain, and we had to think about buying an empty lot and gradually build on it as funds become available. Locating an empty lot near the University facilities was a big challenge. By the grace of ALLAH, a lot was located a few minutes away from the University facilities, and in 1999 we were able to purchase that lot. Unfortunately, and because of city regulations mandating us to leave 50 feet from every side as area that we could not build on, we realized we needed to purchase the adjacent land. For the next year, we pursued the owner of the adjacent land and ALHAMDULLAH in the year 2000 were able to buy it.
With this started the phase of raising money to build the masjid. Over the next 12 years, we attempted many different ways for fundraising: sending letters to Muslims, going to national Islamic conventions and having booths in their bazaar areas seeking funds, having a website for online donations, giving khutbas at other masajid in the United States asking for funds, and doing multiple fundraising events in Charlottesville and Washington D.C. Gradually, funds started to accumulate. In 2006 we contracted a Muslim architect and for the first time had a conceptual image of our next masjid. A few years later, the Muslim Community of Charlottesville was very excited to witness our ground breaking ceremony. Two years later, we had our three-floored unfinished masjid.Our new masjid is 13,500 square feet, over 3 floors; the walk-in basement consists of a library and multipurpose room, the main floor is the musallah area and an administrative office, while the upper floor consists of 8 classrooms to host our weekend Islamic School. Finishing the building was another challenge and fundraising had to continue until ALHAMDULLAH we were able to finish the main floor (musallah area) and moved to have our first prayers in January 2012.
We finished the downstairs Multipurpose room in early 2012 and after two years of Fundraising, we finished the second floor and had our grand opening for that in August of 2015. It is used for all kinds of activites such as our weekly Dar ul Huda Sunday School, Arabic School, Daycare and more. Currently we have been working hard to finish a library that will be available for use by our members. Alhumdulilah we had it completed in early 2017.
As early as 1997, the Muslim community recognized the pressing need to move to a bigger masjid. The rapid growth of the community, exacerbated by the arrival of Muslim refugees from Bosnia, Kosovo, Afghanistan, Somalia, Sudan, and more recently from Iraq compelled the community to work harder in trying to move to a bigger space. The lack of available funding at hand made our search for an existing building in vain, and we had to think about buying an empty lot and gradually build on it as funds become available. Locating an empty lot near the University facilities was a big challenge. By the grace of ALLAH, a lot was located a few minutes away from the University facilities, and in 1999 we were able to purchase that lot. Unfortunately, and because of city regulations mandating us to leave 50 feet from every side as area that we could not build on, we realized we needed to purchase the adjacent land. For the next year, we pursued the owner of the adjacent land and ALHAMDULLAH in the year 2000 were able to buy it.
With this started the phase of raising money to build the masjid. Over the next 12 years, we attempted many different ways for fundraising: sending letters to Muslims, going to national Islamic conventions and having booths in their bazaar areas seeking funds, having a website for online donations, giving khutbas at other masajid in the United States asking for funds, and doing multiple fundraising events in Charlottesville and Washington D.C. Gradually, funds started to accumulate. In 2006 we contracted a Muslim architect and for the first time had a conceptual image of our next masjid. A few years later, the Muslim Community of Charlottesville was very excited to witness our ground breaking ceremony. Two years later, we had our three-floored unfinished masjid.Our new masjid is 13,500 square feet, over 3 floors; the walk-in basement consists of a library and multipurpose room, the main floor is the musallah area and an administrative office, while the upper floor consists of 8 classrooms to host our weekend Islamic School. Finishing the building was another challenge and fundraising had to continue until ALHAMDULLAH we were able to finish the main floor (musallah area) and moved to have our first prayers in January 2012.
We finished the downstairs Multipurpose room in early 2012 and after two years of Fundraising, we finished the second floor and had our grand opening for that in August of 2015. It is used for all kinds of activites such as our weekly Dar ul Huda Sunday School, Arabic School, Daycare and more. Currently we have been working hard to finish a library that will be available for use by our members. Alhumdulilah we had it completed in early 2017.