www.byzcath.org Forums General Discussions Town Hall Ought there to be a mosque @ Ground Zero?

The question is a difficult one. Our Constitutional Freedom of Religion would guarantee all peoples the freedom to worship as they choose, building their own houses of worship as they please (subject to reasonable regulations on location and building codes, etc.).

But having the right to do something does not mean it is the right thing to do. In the 1980s some Carmelite nuns set up shop at Auschwitz. Their intentions were honorable since many Christians were murdered there together with Jews. But the Jews took offense at them setting up shop at what has become a major memorial for them. Pope John Paul II eventually acknowledged their right to be there but asked them to move as it was not the right thing to do. [William McGurran had a good article on this recently in the WSJ: WTC Mosque, Meet the Auschwitz Nuns]. I'd say on that basis alone they should move the location of the mosque a few blocks away from ground zero.

But there is another issue that the West needs to wrestle with. Islam is not just a religion but it is also a political movement. While most Moslems are peaceful people the religion of Islam has a goal of establishing a worldwide caliphate in which Christians, Jews and all non-Muslims are, at best, second class and pay taxes to them for permission to live.

Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf's group to raise $100 million to build the Ground Zero Mosque is called the Cordova Iniative (a registered charity in NY). The title was purposefully chosen as a symbolic remembrance of when Islamic armies took Spain and use the Cathedral in Cordoba as its prize. Imam Faisal Abdul Rauf, president of the Cordoba Initiative, called for Islamic dawa and sharia law to replace the U.S. Constitution. When in Islamic countries he speaks openly of "Ground Zero, the site of the rebirth of Islam’s holy war in the West." In the Islamic countries the Ground Zero Mosque is seen as a symbol of victory, a symbol of Islam replacing the decadent Twin Towers just like the taking of the Cordoba Cathedral was a symbol of victory of Islam over Christian Spain. In America, when speaking English, however, he very much moderates his words. [Tony Vega has an article on this in the Washington Examiner: The Cordoba Initiative mosque near Ground Zero].

There are now a number of successes of pushing Sharia in the U.S. In NJ just recently a judge dismissed a charge against a man for raping his wife (since under Sharia she is his property and he can do whatever he wants with her). In Detroit, Evangelical Christians who gathered across the street from a mosque to witness Christ and distribute literature were arrested and were told not to do so again (again they had appealed to Sharia). And just north of the border in Canada a mother who was convicted of murdering her daughter was given no jail time because she had a right to kill her daughter under Sharia.

That the State Department is paying Imam Faisal Abdul Rauf to go fundraising in the Islamic world to establish a Ground Zero center for the waging of a jihad to conquer America for Islam is unacceptable.

In the Islamic countries the Ground Zero Mosque is seen as a symbol of victory, a symbol of Islam replacing the decadent Twin Towers just like the taking of the Cordoba Cathedral was a symbol of victory of Islam over Christian Spain.