You Belong Here ?

Have you ever felt like you don’t belong? Are the differences between you and your neighbor too great to find common ground? Join us at your community mosque to hear about the kind of community with a place for everyone. We weren’t made to do life alone; we were made to do it together. Each day, we find community in faith. ➤ Join us!

A Mosque Where Everybody Belongs
The Muslim Community Center (MCC) – East Bay is a vibrant faith-based organization that exudes a sense of community. Every day we attempt to love and worship God (great and glorified is He) and follow the teachings of the Holy Qur’an and the guidance of the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him).

Our conviction is driven by a community-minded approach to Islam that appreciates the many opportunities and challenges of being an American Muslim in 2021. That ethos is expressed daily through our many services and programs.

We offer spiritual development and youth empowerment programs that aim to be fun and inspiring. We strive for a family-friendly environment encouraging modesty, creativity, and community involvement. We are responsive, forward-thinking, and an environmentally friendly and special-needs-friendly mosque. Female congregants have led as the President of the Board of Directors from 2016 to 2020, and women have been represented in the leadership since its founding.

As the largest Islamic complex in the Tri-Valley, our Friday prayer service draws about 500 worshipers from across the East Bay. The Center also sponsors public lectures, social service projects and participates in interfaith activities through regional and national religious organizations.

We welcome you to our community center, where we are strengthening faith through the community daily within the precious walls that hold our future.

Our Ethos

MCC is a multi-ethnic, multi-racial, multi-lingual, non-sectarian, diverse, and open community committed to full and equal participation and involvement of men and women who are community members of MCC and subscribe to accept its rules, regulations, and procedures. MCC is committed to civic and civil engagement with communities of other faiths and society.

Programming & Activities

MCC East Bay is a response to the needs of American Muslims in the East Bay area. Our programs are developed by community members and staff to address the unique social and religious demands facing our families.

In addition to being a space for the five daily prayers, the 31,500-square-foot MCC facility bustles each day with a wide range of programs, classes, and activities that serve our community’s wide-ranging, diverse needs.

Our congregation hail from more than 30 nations around the world.

Our Khutbahs (Friday sermons) are intended to be timely, relevant, and mindful of our current situation. Can’t join us live? Watch it later on YouTube.

At MCC, we’re Mosquing every day of the week.

We host a weekday Qur’an, Arabic, and Hifz program for 135 students; Friday evening halaqas for 180 young attendees; Sunday School for 410 students; a family and couples’ counseling room; a youth office; and a multipurpose space for community functions and events as well as private events.

Our programming mirrors the experiences of our congregation members as they retain a unique Muslim identity while being a part of the larger American community.

Our programs include civil rights and civics training for East Bay Muslims; programming for our special-needs families (MCC is the West Coast’s first special-needs friendly mosque); Friday evening family programs, joint activities with other mosques and Islamic organizations, social activities; several large events preceded or followed by a communal dinner, basic Islamic creed classes in Farsi, martial arts and coding classes, weekly book club and English as second language classes, a bi-weekly single moms’ support group, monthly new Muslim book club meetings, social service projects, Friday night basketball, martial arts training, App-developing workshops, and more.

At Jumu’ah, mothers and fathers with young children have private prayer rooms connected with screens and audio to the Main Prayer Hall, and women line up behind the men in a barrier-free space sharing the hall with bookshelves only to demarcate space.

Mission

The Muslim Community Center – East Bay (MCC East Bay) is a religious organization whose primary goal is the emergence of American Muslim identity. Its purpose is to practice and share the values of Islam by providing spiritual, educational, and recreational facilities for members of the public.

Vision

The MCC strives to meet the various needs of its community, both spiritual and not, by providing educational, charitable, and community-oriented services. The MCC invests in the next generation by providing growth and leadership opportunities for youth and young professionals, fashioning spaces for various demographics to come together, and expanding those spaces to accommodate the needs of men and women throughout the community.

Faith in Community

The MCC is an organization that believes in a comprehensive and inclusive understanding of Islam based on the noble principles outlined in the Qur’an and exemplified in the Sunnah (ways and manners of the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him)). It seeks to establish, guide, and serve the East Bay Muslim community as an integral part of society. The MCC designs services, programs, and classes to develop the spirit, mind, and sense of civic responsibility.

The MCC East Bay is a non-profit, tax-exempt organization (with Tax-ID: 20-8085421) formed exclusively for educational, religious, and social purposes. It is registered with the Internal Revenue Service under revenue code 501(c)(3).

All of its activities are following the teachings of the Qur’an and follow the teachings and traditions of Prophet Mohammed (peace be upon him).

MCC East Bay is a multi-ethnic, multi-racial, multi-lingual, non-sectarian, diverse, and open community committed to full and equal participation and involvement of men and women who are community members of MCC and subscribe to accept its rules, regulations, and procedures. MCC is committed to civic and civil engagement with communities of other faiths and society.

Our doors are open to all community members; however, if you wish to become an official member of MCC, please note that MCC membership is open to all Muslims 18 years of age or above who:

  1. Subscribe to the objectives of the MCC Constitution
  2. Agree to work under the general guidance of the MCC Board of Directors and the constitutional framework of MCC.

Youth

Expanding our youth programming since 2017 has been a significant growth marker and a point of personal pride for MCC’s founders.

Youth Director Shaykh Rami Nsour has thoughtfully overseen this expansion with a vision to help develop our youth into better citizens and Muslims by integrating mainstream educational techniques with Islamic principles.

Every Friday evening, Shaykh Rami Nsour and his team of youths — in partnership with The Rahmah Foundation (which leads girls’ halaqas) — educate young minds by emphasizing Islamic values through lessons and extracurricular activities.

The next generation has responded well. That vital pipeline to the youth has already returned dividends. Young graduates return to teach and mentor even younger students in long-running programs like the Sunday School and Friday Night Halaqas. MCC is also a flagship scholarship program via the Islamic Scholarship Fund.

Youth Programming at MCC

  • Youth Jumu’ah with a young speaker (March to November)
  • Spring break & summer youth camps
  • Extracurricular classes like coding, skating, and martial arts
  • Basketball and swimming at HUB 925
  • Youth Council
  • Girl Scouts
  • Ramadan youth qiyams & Iftars
  • Friday night youth halaqas
  • Volunteer-run Sunday School
  • Regularly hosting authors of Islamic children’s books

The youth have called MCC a “spiritual refuge,” a space to “build our identity as Muslims,” and a “place for community reaffirmation.”

Alisha Shaik, an MCC youth interfaith speaker, said the impetus for her and other teens to embark on their spiritual journeys at MCC has been to come to terms with personal questions like:

  • “How can we build a strong Muslim community in America?”
  • “Are we, as Muslims, too isolated from our society?”
  • “What decisions have our elders made for us?”
  • “How can we, as the next generation of Muslim leaders in America, work towards a better public image of our faith in the face of hostility, fear, and ignorance?”

To help guide them on their journeys, Shaykh Rami keeps bi-monthly office hours for spiritual care. He meets regularly with young Muslims whose challenges range from undergoing a crisis of faith to having parents experiencing a divorce to needing to be heard while undergoing a confusing time.

Goals

In pursuit of its Vision, MCC East Bay strives to:

  • Organize religious, educational, social, and cultural faith-based events
  • Promote, strengthen, and implement family values
  • Assist disadvantaged individuals and families
  • Promote cooperation and bridges building among all facets of society
  • Seek constructive dialogue and mutual understanding
  • Further better understanding and appreciation of Islam among people of other faiths and nonfaiths
  • Promote sisterhood, brotherhood, mercy, compassion, and peace.
  • Provide spiritual and community values
  • Religious and language education in the context of living in the USA
  • Socialization and sense of belonging in joy and sorrow
  • Youth who identify themselves with the MCC
  • Community and multi-faith outreach work
  • Ability to vote for the Board and leadership of the MCC

Our History: Major Community Milestones

  • In 2003, about a dozen Tri-Valley Muslims organized a Friday Jumu’ah service in the basement of one person’s home. From there, the community grows and leases a progressively larger space for worship services and Sunday School.
  • In 2006, community leaders drafted a charter for a new regional community center focused on the youth. The MCC East Bay is born.
  • In 2010, a former self-defense training institute in a Pleasanton business park went up for sale. The building’s owner accepts a $4 million offer for the 41,000-square-foot building – about half its appraised value from just a few years prior.
  • In the fall of 2010, a dream was realized when the community moved into its permanent digs: a five-acre site that – after major phases of improvements – houses a large prayer hall, conference hall, banquet hall, and 21 classrooms.
  • Since 2013, a tenant has been leasing 10,000 square feet from MCC, and hundreds of members have been paying monthly dues that provide a steady stream of operating income to fulfill the founding mandate of a bustling faith-based community space, professionally managed and dedicated to family and youth.
  • In 2017, all interest-free community loans (Karz-e-Hasana) were returned to community member lenders. The building is also paid for by selling a three-acre parcel of Dublin that the community had owned in hopes of building a purpose-built mosque one day.

The Future of MCC in the Tri-Valley

With each passing year, the Muslim community in the Tri-Valley has grown more diverse and more visible. The fusion of immigrant and indigenous influences has shaped the region’s cultural landscape over the last several decades.

We are now positioning ourselves for a growth and engagement trajectory as second and third-generation families expand and mature.

Major building projects in the past five years have included renovation of the worship space, conference room, and bathrooms; landscape, parking lot, and security upgrades; and improvement of our classroom spaces and our Montessori tenant’s rental space.

A full-scale expansion and renovation are being planned and will be scheduled.

The future remodeling plans include adding a library, senior and youth lounges, a cafe, and a new banquet hall space with a service kitchen.

Future programming for MCC includes youth camping trips, a seniors’ social club, food delivery and scheduled social visits for homebound elders and the ill, and better services for our young professionals who tend to be transient and require more specialized programming to engage.

Ways To Stay Connected

Life can be rough on us! We struggled with being disconnected from family, friends & the Muslim community.

➤ We invite you to step forward in connecting with your MCC  family. Subscribe to our Thursday newsletter below.

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Our Organizational Goals

  • Cultivating an open, inclusive, and welcoming Muslim community rooted in the Qur’an, the sunnah of the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH), and the Islamic tradition
  • Inspiring conviction in Islamic principles through sound Islamic knowledge
  • Providing safe space for reflection, exploration, and development of faith
  • Promoting a contextualized and dynamic vision and practice of Islam in America
  • Leading civic engagement efforts rooted in social justice, particularly to serve the Greater East Bay Area
  • Building leadership capacity in our community, particularly among teens and young professionals
  • Fostering open and honest communication across generations to promote the integrity of families and develop community solidarity
  • Supporting the spiritual, emotional, and mental well-being of our community members
  • Developing cross-cultural awareness and appreciation of diversity within our community
  • Engaging with other faith communities in stewardship of our society

The Muslim Community Center – East Bay is a mosque and community center that serves over 500 congregants at its weekly Friday services and countless others in the East Bay community by offering its space and a variety of community programming.

Our Mission
MCC serves the spiritual, educational, social, and cultural needs of the East Bay Muslim community and society while exemplifying excellence and fostering peace.

Our Vision
MCC is where faith manifests in action, compassion, and excellence.

Our Core Values

  • Compassion
  • Integrity
  • Transparency
  • Excellence

Hosting unique programs for our community is near and dear to our hearts. We truly feel blessed at every opportunity to worship, hang out, learn and serve together. Please consider donating to keep seeing events happening at MCC. Link

MCC believes the future of the Muslim community and other marginalized communities depends on sustaining and strengthening a strong and educated democratic society. We proudly engage our congregation and community in civil discourse and civic engagement.