The East London Mosque and Al-Isharah have improved access to the BSL signed sermon on Fridays.

In 2009 we launched the UK’s first signed khutbah (Friday sermon) – and were delighted how many deaf Muslims came to benefit from this.

Initially there were two interpreters for the separate male and female prayer areas. It was quite expensive, so later this was reduced to one interpreter by using a video link to a reserved area. Although an improvement, it was still not entirely satisfactory, as it restricted locations where deaf people could see the interpreter.

We have taken this an important step further: the interpreter is now shown ‘Picture-in-Picture’ alongside the Imam, so deaf Muslims can benefit from the sermon on screens throughout the mosque complex.

This makes the Friday sermon more accessible than ever. As well as joining the 5000+ people who experience the sermon live at the Mosque, you can download the audio from the ELM website, or watch the sermon on its YouTube channel (note: videos do not yet included BSL signing).

[updated: 14:24 - 05/05/2015]