Shaykh Muḥammad Nāṣir Al-Dīn Al-Albānī – may Allāh have mercy on him – said while answering questions from women, recorded in the famous Fatāwā Jeddah collection:
Here is a question that I find very strange: what is the best way [to give] daʿwah? How is daʿwah [given]?
I say to the women: stay in your homes, the matter of daʿwah does not concern you. I reject using the word “daʿwah” between the youth [in this way], “these are the people of daʿwah”, as if daʿwah has become the fashion of the times. Anyone who has some amount of knowledge has become a dāʿīyah (caller). Not only has this afflicted young men, it has gone on to include young women, and to the women of the household; they have ended up turning away from fulfilling their obligations at home and towards their husbands, and turned to things that are not obligatory upon them, namely doing daʿwah.
One of the previous questions concerned a women who had heard from a recording of me during a meeting in Kuwait that it is not allowed for women to go out for daʿwah. And here this question asks what is the best way to give daʿwah? How is daʿwah given? The rule is that the woman stays in her home, and it is not allowed for here to go out except for a pressing need. We previously mentioned the statement of the Prophet – peace and blessings of Allāh be upon him: ‘And their houses are better for them’ than praying in the mosque. Now we see a widespread phenomenon amongst women, they go out a lot to the mosques to pray in congregation, let alone Jumuʿah. Their houses are better for them, except – as I previously mentioned – if the imām in the mosque is knowledgeable and teaches those who are present some knowledge of the religion; so the woman can go out to pray in the mosque and to hear knowledge, this is alright. But as for becoming occupied with daʿwah, [then no], she should sit in her house and read the books provided by her husband, or brother or other maḥram relatives. Having done that, it is alright for her to set aside a day and invite women to attend at her house, or for her to go to one of their houses [to teach], and this is better than having a group of women go out, it is better that one of them goes to them than all of them coming to her.
As for her travelling, perhaps even without a maḥram, trying to justify this by saying she is going out to do daʿwah, then this is a bidʿah of the current times – and I do not say this about women only, it applies even to young men who love to talk concerning daʿwah although their level of knowledge is still shallow.
Al-Albānī, Muḥammad Nāṣir Al-Dīn. Fatāwā Jeddah, Tape 25. MP3. [online] http://www.alalbany.net/3714. Accessed .