Major church to be transformed into mosque after £3.5m purchase by Muslim group

A long-closed church in Watford is set to become a modern mosque after being acquired by a Muslim charity for £3.5 million.

St Thomas’ United Reformed Church in Hertfordshire, United Kingdom, which shut its doors in 2015 due to severe structural issues, was originally set for demolition and reconstruction. Although planning permission was granted twice, the redevelopment never went ahead, and the property was eventually placed on the market.

In December, the local Ar-Rahmah Trust purchased the 20,000 sq ft site and is now fundraising an additional £1.5 million to renovate and reopen it as Masjid Al-Ummah by next year, promising “facilities like never before.”

The sale was finalized in January, with the charity raising the initial funds through “Qardh Hasanah,” an Islamic finance concept referring to interest-free charitable loans. To repay short-term financing, Ar-Rahmah has launched a crowdfunding campaign aiming to collect £500,000 by the end of the month. So far, 477 supporters have contributed £452,555.

The organization hopes to gather the full renovation amount by December and open the mosque in 2026, with plans to repay the remaining loan by January 2027.

According to a Launchgood fundraising page, the mosque will provide a “welcoming, non-sectarian, and non-partisan environment that provides accessible spaces for worship, learning, and community engagement,” as reported by the Watford Observer.

Masjid Al-Ummah will feature a women’s gym, nursery, food bank, Koran classes, social spaces for older people, youth facilities, a sports hall, a digital library, study hubs, and mortuary services.

The project website highlights Watford’s growing Muslim population, now estimated at 15,000, and notes that existing places of worship struggle to accommodate the demand, especially during busy periods like Jummah prayers and Ramadan.

“Masjid Al Ummah will address the community’s spiritual, educational, social, and well-being needs, inspired by the traditional role of a masjid as hub for prayer, learning, and community cohesion,” the website states.

Trustees have reportedly engaged with local residents in the Nascot area to ensure ongoing community involvement in the development.

This conversion follows other similar transformations, such as the former St Chad’s Church in Blackburn, which became Masjid-e-Taqwa after a major renovation in 2023, and a Victorian Methodist church in Bradford set to be converted into a mosque after sitting vacant since 2020.

However, not all proposals of this nature have moved forward. In August last year, the Church of England prevented a former Grade II-listed church in Stoke-on-Trent from becoming a mosque, invoking a legal clause that prohibits places of Christian worship from being repurposed for another religion.

Figures from the National Churches Trust reveal that over 3,500 churches have closed in the UK over the past decade, with many being repurposed as homes or community centers. Census data from 2021 showed that 46% of people in England and Wales identified as Christian — a drop of 13 percentage points since 2011 — while the Muslim population rose to 6.5%, up from 4.9% a decade earlier.

(DAILY MAIL)