Day 310: Portland Rizwan Mosque, Portland, Oregon
📌APIA Every Day (310) - The Portland Rizwan Mosque, built in 1987, is a local chapter of the international Ahmadiyya Muslim Community. Founded in 1889 by Mirza Ghulam Ahmad in India, the Ahmadiyya Mission first spread to the United States in the 1920s, as Ahmadi Muslim immigrants sought refuge from persecution. As the first mosque built in Portland, the Rizwan Mosque quickly became an important multiethnic religious center for the city, serving the local Muslim community for decades.
The roots of the Portland Ahmadiyya Muslim community trace back to Pakistani and Indian university students and professionals who settled in Oregon during the 1960s. This small group gathered at various residences to pray and commemorate Islamic celebrations with no regard to sectarian differences. In 1966, the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community of Portland was officially incorporated. As the local Muslim community grew, gaining more South Asian and African American members, services were held at locations such as the St. Pius X Church and the Jenkins Estate. Eventually in the 1980s, as the need for a formal worship space became clear, two doctors initiated fundraising efforts to build a mosque.
In 1985, with permission from the Ahmadiyya Community, the congregation purchased land in a residential neighborhood of Portland for its future religious center. Two years later, in 1987, the Portland Muslim community gathered to celebrate the placement of the mosque’s first foundation stone. Later that same year, the building was dedicated in a ceremony attended by the Khalifa of the Ahmadiyya Mission, inaugurating the Rizwan Mosque as an official branch of the Ahmadiyya movement. The mosque’s design blended traditional Islamic features, like a tall minaret, with the style of typical American suburban architecture.
Today, the Portland Rizwan Mosque serves a culturally diverse congregation which is primarily South Asian but also includes Southeast Asians and African Americans. The mosque continues to hold daily services and, like other Ahmadiyya centers across the country, organizes various social programs and community outreach events. One of the most significant of these programs is Open Mosque Day, an annual event during the holy month of Ramadan where neighbors are invited to join the congregation for Iftar and learn about Islam.
Written by Avneet Dhalwal
LEARN MORE:
Pluralism Project Archive: Ahmadiyya Muslim Community
Open Mosque Day: Muslims host Ramadan event, Iftar dinner
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