Folks, after waiting a bit from the initial ruckus and after weighing various viewpoints and opinions, I’ve decided to add my 5 cents to this debate and declare my opposition to the building of the so-called “Ground Zero Mosque”, or “Cordoba House,” or whatever they are calling it now.
Mine is not a denial of the right of Muslims to build houses of worship in the USA, nor of their right to do with their private property as they please. But in this very special, very specific instance, I ask for exquisite sensitivity.
This project, spearheaded by a Muslim leader who once stated that Americans were “co-responsible” for the 9/11 atrocity and who refuses to condemn Islamic terrorist groups such as Hamas, is a polarizing, divisive figure. For that, he has lost all credibility for his subsequent appeals to peace, mutual understanding, and reconciliation. He’s a divider, not a uniter, and this project has inherited his bad reputation.
The truth remains that on September 11, 2001, 19 men crying “Allahu Akbar” (“God is Great” in Arabic, the traditional Muslim war cry) killed 3,000 Americans in cold blood. We don’t need a reminder of this cry so close to the hollowed ground where so many died.
Dear Muslim friends, build your mosque elsewhere in Manhattan. Respect our dead. Respect our hollowed ground.
- Read also High Noon at Ground Zero at The American Catholic
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10 comments:
As an atheist, I totally disagree.
First, you can’t simultaneously acknowledge a right and insist that it be suppressed. If you want religious freedom, then you can't deny them their right to worship wherever or whenever they choose.
Second, its not strictly a mosque, its a community center.
Third and most important... ITS NOT IN GROUND ZERO!
If you deny these people their right, then I saw we go the extra step and prohibit any religion from building structures 5 miles from wherever they have perpetrated horrible acts. So all catholic churches where children have been abused should be closed down. Evangelical churches near the area where a doctor has been gunned down should also be closed, and so on and so forth.
Your rights are not better than their rights.
That's right, it's not in Ground Zero. Right now there's nothing there, except for a big empty space with people working within it. The mosque - aka "community center" - is where the red square is.
As a believer, I note your opinion, and dismiss it with the same nonchalantry you dismiss my belief. If we stopped from building a convent near Auschwitz, Muslims can build elsewhere too.
But you don't give a damn anyway. The enemy of your enemy is your friend, regardless of the justice of the situation. So please, don't make me laugh "que tengo los labios partidos."
-Theo
Hey, I'd be happy if people stopped constructing religious buildings in general, but that doesn't give me the right to force them to stop them from building them.
You and many others criticize us atheist for grouping all believers together with the crazy fanatics and yet you do the same when you prohibit mainstream or moderate muslims from building a center, as if they were terrorists.
I never said it was a good decision, or well though out, but I don't have the right, just like you don't have the right, to stop them from making stupid decisions.
PS. Auschwitz is not in the USA.
YES I CONCUR WITH YOU TEO...JUST BECAUSE A PERSON HAS THE RIGHT TO DO SOMETHING,DOESN'T MEAN THAT IT'S THE RIGHT THING TO DO.THE BUZZ PHRASE FOR MANY YEARS NOW HAS BEEN...DON'T UPSET THE MUSLIM SENSIBILITIES AND SENSITIVITIES...BUT THAT GOES BOTH WAYS.
I AM VERY DISAPPOINTED AND BEWILDERED IN OBAMA...HE IS NOT REPRESENTING THE MAJORITY OF AMERICANS.
DEPENDING ON THE OUTCOME OF THIS ISSUE...I THINK THIS IS GOING TO BE A DEFINING TIME FOR AMERICA.
My objections are not religious in nature. Many Muslims died on 9/11. The point is that the place is inappropriate and the "moderate" credentials of the Imam leading the effort, questionable.
But I'm sure that the facts will not sway you. As always.
-Theo
Thank you, Bryn. I don't need tolerance lessons from the mosque defenders, much less from atheists, whose ascerbic coterie of late is nowhere being as tolerant as they want others to be.
Time is now for the Imam and his corporation to be tolerant, sensitive, and respectful toward the rest of us. Respect is a two-way street.
If Hitler had claimed that 'Mein Kampf' was revealed by God, would that have made the Nazi Party a religion?
Islam is first and foremost a totalitarian political system. The Muslims' only loyalty is to the Ummah - the global 'brotherhood' of believers in Islam. Muslim theology describes the West as Dar al-Harb - the domain of war, consequently they regard their host countries as ripe for plunder, predation, extortion, parasitism and eventual subversion and takeover.
Islam can add nothing to Western societies apart from trouble.
Muslims in America will have to choose between loyalty to their country and loyalty to Islam. The two are irreconcilable - Islam is implacable and allows of no compromise on this matter.
Ditto from In Defense of the Children of Light...
This is just them putting up their flag, i.e. Cordoba (That is what they call themselves by the way), Hagia Sophia, The Temple Mount and hundreds of hundreds of places all over the Middle East and North Africa, where for over 400 years, the Mohammadens conquered by the sword and took over 2/3 of Christian Lands by force, killing and enslaving all in their path before the Christians fought back in 1099. When they set up their Mosques, they placed them on Christian or other religious sites.
The news of building a mosque at ground zero is just to distract the majority of American moderate people from the criminal act that terry jones is up to. As the 911 is an inside job there is no point in accusing muslims of being killers. And as far as I'm concerned, I'd like to kill terry jones myself for what he is doing. terry jones and his followers are taking america to a war now, and this time I don't think america would not be hurt. terry jones is the real culprit behind all this. The mosque is not being built at ground zero at all, it's just a propaganda going on. (just to distract as I've mentioned).
Eagle.
Yes, 9/11 an "inside job". Right.
Maybe Osama really works for the CIA.
Heck, maybe you really work for CIA, "eagle" in order to give Muslims a bad name. Maybe you are just an information ops agent.
Smoke and mirrors, please.
-Theo
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