London’s second ever Big Gay Iftar proved communities can come together to show love and solidarity. Held in St Andrew’s Church in Waterloo, the Big Gay Iftar brought together the Muslim and LGBTI communities to celebrate the end of Ramadan. With a packed-out room and a lengthy waiting list, guests ate together on a fabulous giant rainbow flag.

There were also buckets, where guests could donate to the Finsbury Park Mosque – a London mosque involved in a recent attack. Gay Star News spoke to three Muslims involved in the Big Gay Iftar and their thoughts on how the month of Ramadan went this year.

Asad Dhunna

An Iftar is a fast-breaking ceremony that you do during Ramadan, but why Big Gay Iftar?

So when Orlando happened last year, I was already having an Iftar around at my house for about eight people and just realized that wasn’t enough. So I called Giles [faith leader of St Andrews Church] and Giles said ‘Yeah sure, have the church hall’ and so I thought how I was going to get people to the church.

Here’s the church, here’s the steeple – where are the people? Miraculously, within four days, we managed to get 80 people involved and it was an amazing event so we had to do it again.