One Mosque Sector Townhall 2025: New path for youth, seniors and spiritual care in mosques

The One Mosque Sector (OMS) Townhall 2025 brought together 250 mosque leaders today for a dialogue session with Acting Minister-in-charge of Muslim Affairs, Associate Professor Muhammad Faishal Ibrahim. The session highlighted key developments and progress in Community Religious Life (CRL) initiatives (see Annex A) first announced at the OMS Summit 2025 in February 2025.

Strengthening youth and seniors engagement

Youth engagement

2. The mosque sector is intensifying efforts to bring youths closer to the mosque.  In collaboration with National Youth Council, the Islamic Religious Council of Singapore (MUIS) and the mosque sector are working to better understand the evolving aspirations and concerns of Muslim youth.

3. Themes of identity, relationships and livelihood, and how youths related to their faith, were discussed at the NextGen25: SG Mosque Youth Symposium 2025 in September 2025 and the Dialogue with Mufti in November 2025. Collectively, about 500 youth participated across the two events, and shared valuable insights such as identifying key challenges in balancing social relationships, identity, career choices, and religious practices with Islamic values. Insights from these engagements will be further developed into youth programmes in 2026 and funded by the CRL Collaboration Fund.

Senior-friendly mosques

4. With Singapore’s ageing population, our mosques are also exploring new initiatives to transform the mosque sector to be more senior-friendly. This includes addressing the spiritual needs and mental well-being of seniors, promoting active ageing, facilitating social connection and companionship, as well as providing accessible and conducive spaces to allow seniors to worship and learn in the mosque. 

5. An example is the Santunan Emas programme, initiated by Al-Muttaqin Mosque in collaboration with Muhammadiyah Active Ageing Centre and Ma:een. The programme integrates religious learning with physical exercises to holistically strengthen our seniors’ physical, spiritual and emotional well-being (see http://santunanemas.sg). Hasanah Mosque has also piloted an elderly space within the mosque to provide social, health and religious activities to foster bonds and companionship among seniors Building on the success of the Santunan Emas programme, there are ongoing plans to expand this initiative to other mosques across Singapore. This will allow more seniors to benefit from programmes specifically designed for their life stage, creating more opportunities for meaningful engagement within their local mosque communities. These efforts aim to create more inclusive, spiritually enriching environments as well as to inform future programmes for seniors.

Advancing capabilities in Islamic spiritual care and guidance

6. Beyond serving as places of worship, our mosques also serve as hubs that provide holistic Islamic Spiritual Care and Guidance (ISCG). This emerging field supports individuals by integrating emotional, psychological, and spiritual care grounded in Islamic ethics. More asatizah are increasingly expected to extend their roles beyond Islamic teaching and worship, towards supporting individuals through life by partnering healthcare institutions, prisons and social service agencies.

7. Such work has started in the last 5 years, such as through in-care and aftercare of inmates and ex-offenders offered by FITRAH. In the healthcare sector, Masjid Al-Muttaqin, Masjid Darussalam and Masjid Darul Ghufran have collaborated with hospitals, homes and hospices to deploy asatizah to provide Islamic spiritual care and guidance to their patients. In October 2025, Masjid Al-Muttaqin was recently recognised by Singapore Hospice Council as the founding stakeholder of the Compassionate Communities SG movement. 

8. There is value in expanding our asatizah’s capabilities to allow more mosques to provide ISCG to those who seek help, and to enable them to contribute in sectors beyond healthcare and prisons. MUIS has initiated efforts to learn about the ISCG in other parts of the world and how it can be applied to the Singapore context. See Annex B for the details. To deepen local understanding of ISCG, MUIS hosted Dr Joshua Salaam, Director and Chaplain of Student Life at Duke University and President of the Association of Muslim Chaplains (USA) at today’s OMS Townhall, who shared his experience on how ISCG may be applied to Singapore.

Formation of CRL Steering Committee to provide strategic direction to build a vibrant Community Religious Life

9. MUIS has formally established the CRL Steering Committee, which will be co-chaired by Mufti and Chief Executive MUIS. This follows the announcement at the OMS Summit 2025 on 08 February 2025. Comprising MUIS senior leaders and sector representatives (see Annex C), the CRL Steering Committee will provide strategic direction to ensure coordinated, impactful religious programmes that will nurture confident Muslims, resilient families, and an empowered community.