The concepts of pluralism, diversity, and geography of religions are used here in consonance with the Pluralism Project by Diana L. Eck´s (www.pluralism.org). New Religious Movements are discussed here in the context of Massimo Introvigne’s project page at www.cesnur.org .

The most astonishing common feature of New Religious Movements in Barcelona is their relative invisibility compared to most other European countries. Without having the exact address, most places of worship for Non-Christians are practically untraceable.

The most prominent New Religious Movement of South Asian origin in Barcelona is ISKCON, the International Society of Krishna Consciousness, whose adherents, called devotees, are widely known as Hare Krishnas. The movement was founded 1967 by A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada in the United States. As their mandir (temple) is the most important place for Hindu-worship in Barcelona, about 200 Indian families are connected to the ISKCON mandir. Since 1975 ISKCON has a temple in Barcelona and 1997 they bought the apartment, which hosts the current mandir, in Plaza Reial. It is mainly run by the temple committee and eight devotees, who live in the very same apartment.

Copyright © Thomas Gugler

Standing in front of the door, there is no sign or symbol marking the house as a Hindu place of worship.

Under the guidance of Srila Prabhupada seventy women and men take darshan of Sri Sri Gaur-Nitai during the weekly Sunday festival here.

Copyright © Thomas Gugler

Sri Sri Gaur-Nitai refers to the historical founder of Bengal Vaishnavism, Caitanya Mahaprabhu, who is also named Gauranga (Sanskrit for “being of golden colour”). He and his brother Nityananda are believed to be incarnations of Krishna and Balarama.

Copyright © Thomas Gugler

Since 1986 one of the devotees runs the Govinda-Restaurant at Plaza Villa de Madrid, where the purely vegetarian-Indian prasada, the remnants of food offered to the Lord, is served by Christian waiters.

Barcelona hosts four Sikh gurudwaras. Though not exactly a New Religious Movement, the Gurdarshan Sahib Ji Gurudwara is, after the Sri Sri Gaur-Nitai ISKCON Temple, the second most important place of worship for immigrants from India. This biggest and most centrally located gurudawara opened in August 2004 and hosts up to 1200 Sikhs on the weekly Sunday festival. Every day this place invites for kirtan and bhajan (religious songs) at 1 pm, after which Punjabi food is served for free at 2.30 pm. Besides Hindus and Muslims, Christians are also invited to join and offer their obeisance. With about 250 visitors every day this place is incredibly popular among immigrants especially from India, Nepal, and Sri Lanka.

As many immigrants from India and practically all the immigrants from Pakistan and Bangladesh are Muslims, Islam constitutes a special case among the religions of the Diaspora communities in Spain.

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 The most important place for worship by Muslims from Bangladesh is the Shah Jalal Masjid (Mezquita in Spanish), established in 2006, which calls itself also the Cultural Center of Bangladesh. Bangladesh is currently going through a process of Islamization, which is causing many institutions to shift to a more purist interpretation of Islam. The connection of Islam to ethnicity gives this mosque a clear profile on the Muslim market in Barcelona.

Inside the mosque, four prayer rooms on two floors invite Bangladeshi Muslims to recite the namaz. During my visit the large hall was surprisingly empty with less than ten male Muslims joining salaat-e ´asr.

The obvious disparity between the mosque´s size and the number of people congregating here for prayer raises further questions, for instance about the funding. This mosque is a meeting place for Ahl-e Hadith activists and has a close cooperation with the Tarek Ibn Ziyad Masjid, a cooperation, which becomes visible for example during Ramadan. It cannot be stressed too much that there is a strong need for research-projects on Bangladeshi mosques in Europe. Mosques in Barcelona are a well-known meeting point of often illegal immigrants from Bangladesh and Pakistan, who choose to go to Europe via Iran, Turkey and Greece. Some of them are known to arrive in containers being shipped from Greece to the port of Barcelona. Some mosques are suspected to promote illegal immigration, a fact, which would contravene the state license, on which the mosque, among others, also has to testify, that it is neither serving alcoholic drinks nor running a restaurant.

About a two minute walk from Shah Jalal and in the same street where the central gurudwara is, one finds the biggest mosque in Barcelona : the Tarek bin Ziyad Masjid, which is associated with the Islamic Missionary Movement Tablighi Jama´at.

This movement was founded in Mewat, India, in 1926. In Spain , where the movement is also called Dawa al-Tabligh, it has been active since the 1970s. Media reports identified mosques associated with the Tablighi Jama´at  as meeting points for the terrorists of 11-M (11th March 2004). This controversy has led worshippers congregating there to be suspicious of outsiders, especially when visitors show up for the first time.

Despite some distance the authorities will always treat visitors correctly, though the unfortunate hermeneutics of suspicion have increased after a group of Moroccans  was suspected for preparing a bomb attack in Barcelona in summer 2007. (See the Article in the Daily al-Pais).
This might be one of the reasons why the mosque is not recognizable as a place of worship from the main street (though there is a board at the back-entrance, which opens to a street with high traffic of prostitutes and drug dealers, many of whom come from African countries).

Inside the mosque three floors give space for over a thousand worshippers who join in for the Friday-prayers.

The second floor also hosts a madrassa, a place where children and converts can learn Qur´an and study the Faza´il-e ´Amal, the main publication of the movement, written by Muhammad Zakariyya (1898-1982), who was the nephew of the movement’s founder Muhammad Ilyas (1885-1944).

As more than one thousand Muslims, mostly Africans and Arabs from Tunisia and Morocco, recite the namaz here on Fridays, some of them may have to line up outside the building. However, most of the people in charge of the masjid, among them the person who instructs the people where to line up (in the picture right), are immigrants from the Indian subcontinent.

The Tablighi Jama´at runs also the much smaller An-nour Masjid at Jaume l, which has an area of about 150 square meters if one is willing to count the upper floor, which serves as a place to sleep and cook for Tablighi preachers during khuruj mostly. In both Mosques one may find Arab lay-preachers, mostly from Morocco, almost during the entire day.

The two mosques of the Tablighi Jama´at preach a Sunni Islam connected to the school of Deoband, in Northern India. As most Muslims from South Asia would more likely consider themselves Barelwi (Ahl-e Sunnat), it is not surprising, that there are more Ahl-e Sunnat mosques in Barcelona.

The biggest Barelwi masjid in central Barcelona is the new Centro Cultural Camino de la Paz in Sant Antoni, which just opened on 7th September 2007 and is run by the Minhaj al-Qur´an movement. The movement was founded 1980 in Lahore, Pakistan, by Dr. Muhammad Tahir ul-Qadri (born 1951), the author of Nizam-e Mustafa. It is active in Spain since 1987. As many mosques struggle with the license from the Spanish State, there is not the smallest hint on the door that a mosque could be hidden behind it. In order to apply for the State license mosques are asked among other things to give proof of an emergency exit, a toilet accessible by wheelchair, and the use of non-flammable praying carpets.

Inside the mosque a large prayer room with an area of around 400 sqare meters invites also the Arab youth to join the recitation of the namaz.

Since 1996 the Minhaj ul-Qur´an runs an approximately 300 square meter-large mosque in Arc de Teatre.

The only Ahl-e Sunnat mosque of Barcelona, which has two floors, is located in one of the suburbs, called Besos. The Centro De Cultura Jamia Masjid Ghulmane Mustafa Catalunya opened in 2004. 

It also hosts a modest madrassa for children. The upper floor also has some private rooms in which the Imam can spend the night. The writing of the poster on the wall literally says: “I love Da´wat-e Islami”, which is a Missionary Movement founded 1981 in Karachi, Pakistan, by Maulana Muhammad Ilyas Qadri Attar (born 1950).

The Da´wat-e Islami also runs its own mosque, which the Mosque Comittee prefers to call “centre” or markaz, in central Barcelona. The mosque is called Faizan-e Madina and was inaugurated by British representatives of the movement in April 2007. Though the Faizan-e Madina with its rougly 180 square meters is not the largest mosque, it usually attracts about 200 to 250 Muslim worshippers, mostly immigrants from Pakistan, to join the namaz on Fridays. The donations of the people congregating for the Friday prayers can merely fund the monthly rent of 1.500 EUR. Sine the mosque’s modest budget is unable to pay for other expenses, for instance pay the Imam, he makes his own living by running a PCO shop (Locutorio in Spanish) on the side.

The movement celebrates a weekly ijtema´ for the brethren on Saturday from ´asr to maghreb (including both). During this ceremony, a lay-preacher recites na´at (prayers of praise) from the Mukhilan-e Madina written by Muhammad Ilyas Attar. About seventy women congregate here for the ijtema´ of the sisters, which takes place on Saturdays between zohr and ´asr. This is the time between the prayers, when the mosque is not occupied by men. This gathering is modelled after the program for the brethren, though headed by a woman-preacher who is the sister of the Imam. All sermons are given in Urdu and inspired by the Rasail-e Attariya.

The 26-year-old Imam, who attracts the local Pakistani youth, delivers the sermon during the Fridays´ prayers. One cannot but recognize the poster on the wall, which we have already seen in the Ahl-e Sunnat Masjid in Besos – declaring love to Da´wat-e Islami.

Copyright © Thomas Gugler

During the weekly congregation (ijtema´) on Sunday religious lectures (dars) are read by lay-preachers. Most dars are taken out of Ilyas Attar´s Faizan-e Sunnat (3^rd rev. Ed., Karachi: Maktaba tul-Madina 2006).