Following a tremendously successful debut event in 2019, the second Sufi Festival of Islamic Arts and Mysticism will take place in Glasgow on July 23–24.
Senior representatives of all the major faith groups will be welcomed to the festival at a special reception event, which will be hosted at the acclaimed arts venue Tramway and the adjacent Hidden Gardens. The Lord Provost of Glasgow, elected members of local government, a senior representative of the Scottish government, the Archbishop of Glasgow, William Nolan, and Senior Rabbi of Scotland, Moshe Rubin, as well as eminent Islamic scholars from around the world—two of whom can trace their ancestry to the Prophet Muhammad—will be among them.
The Sufi Festival, a significant occasion for the Muslim community in Scotland, is devoted to presenting the art, culture, and mysticism of Sufism.
This year, the event’s organizers revealed a new charitable alliance with the UK-based Penny Appeal, which offers assistance and welfare to citizens of the UK as well as humanitarian support in over 52 other nations. The University of Edinburgh Al-Waleed Center, Tramway Theatre/Glasgow Life, Artzi-i, the largest dedicated Islamic art gallery in the UK, Awaz FM, and British Muslim TV are other partners.
The main programme will be presented on Sunday, while a brand-new feature, the Sufi Conference, will take place on Saturday. It will feature talks by two of the world’s foremost experts in Islamic religious studies: the Syrian-American author Sheikh Muhammad Al-Ninowy and the Egyptian-British Sheikh Ahmed Saad Al-Azhari, director of the Madina Institute and professor of theology at the University of Atlanta in Georgia.
The event is a high point in Scotland’s post-COVID cultural rehabilitation and is funded by Creative Scotland, Arts and Business Scotland, and the Glasgow Community Mental Health and Wellbeing Fund.
The only specialised Muslim arts organisation in Scotland is Sufi Festivals (SCIO), and this summer’s festival is by far the most important arts and culture event on the calendar of the Muslim community in Scotland.