On Wednesday, the Muslim Student Association (MSA) held a meeting to strengthen their members’ religious commitment by organizing two skill-based workshops.
For the first workshop, students used strings and beads to create prayer beads, which are ritual objects used to honor God. For Muslims, God is recognized with 99 different names and each bead represents one name.
“Making prayer beads is a good tool for relieving anxiety and being able to [repeat] God’s names throughout the day,” said junior Nadia Mansourian, vice president of MSA.
The ability to create the prayer beads as a group brought a sense of community to the members.
“[Gathering together] is a pretty significant part of our religion,” junior Rayyan Mohamed said. “By getting together with our sisters and brothers, we build a stronger sense of community, [allowing us to] grow off our religion together.”
The second workshop was specifically intended for boys, who had the opportunity to practice delivering sermons, which are speeches presented before a special prayer on Fridays.
“No matter how many sermons that you do, you always need practice to become better,” sophomore Mustafa Farhan said.
MSA members felt that it was necessary to hold more gatherings in the future in order to keep up with religious rituals.
“We can get lost in the world of materialism,” Mansourian said. “[Meetings] are a good reminder to stay grounded as Muslims.”
