The mufti of İstanbul, Hasan Kamil Yılmaz, stated that the legal status of the Turkish mosques would be changed through an agreement to be signed between the Directorate of Religious Affairs, or Diyanet, and the Ministry of Environment and Urban Planning.
The mufti said that ‘the relation between the mosque and the people has changed through the time’, complaining that ‘the mosque has started to be considered as only a place for worship.’
He announced that the status of the mosques would be differentiated and categorised into 6 or 7 categories like district, square, mall mosques, according to an agreement that would be signed between Diyanet and the Ministry of Environment and Urban Planning.
The mufti said that ‘the mosques would not only be places for worship but would contain facilities for the young, the women, the children, the elderly, the retired to sit, talk and read, as they used to be during the Golden Age.’ The ‘Golden Age’ refers to the age of the ‘righteous caliphs’ at the beginning of Islamic history, which is called “Asr-ı Saadet” in Turkish.
This agreement will be the next step of the religionization of the daily life in Turkey by Diyanet, which has a huge budget that has been continuously growing during the rule of the Justice and Development Party (AKP).
Diyanet has been recently cooperating with Ministry of Youth and Sports for “marriage schools”, it is also running other campaigns in state dorms, such as “morning prayer meetings”, which forces students to participate in morning prayers.
Diyanet has also decided to form youth branches in mosques in order to prevent youth from joining religious movements that 'spoil Islam.' The formation of youth branches will initially be applied to mosques in central areas and each youth branch will be active at the mosque in which it was formed. The branches will meet for morning prayers and Quran lessons.
On May 5, Mehmet Görmez, the President of Diyanet, met with the Secretary-General of the Association of Muslim Scholars in Iraq Muthanna Harith Al-Dari, who is on the United Nations Security Council’s Sanction List of ‘individuals financing Al-Qaida and Islamic State’
