Do We Deserve a Mosque at Ground Zero?

[Geee]

TownHall:



Do We Deserve a Mosque at Ground Zero?
by Diana West


The second attack on the World Trade Center is coming. It will stand 13 stories high, cost $100 million dollars and include a mosque. Known as Cordoba House -- the name echoing an early caliphate that, of course, subjugated non-Muslims -- it will be located two blocks away from where our magnificent towers crashed and burned, easy wafting distance for the Islamic call to prayer.

How demoralizing is that? Let's step back for some historical perspective. With the U.S. military preparing its assault on the Taliban stronghold of Kandahar, there's a not-too-wild comparison to be made between the mind-blowing reality of New York City approving a mosque at Ground Zero and the unthinkable notion of Honolulu authorities, with GIs massing for the ultimately unnecessary invasion of Japan, approving Shinto shrine construction adjacent to Pearl Harbor.

Both are equally outrageous. But there is a key difference. During World War II, the militaristic cult of Shintoism, the state religion of Imperial Japan, was always understood to be enemy ideology. In our irresponsibly long war, we have never, ever acknowledged that Islam, with its supremacist cult of jihad, is the enemy threat doctrine. And that's not because I say so. It's because the enemy says so, 24-7, and so do his mainstream, unimpeachable Islamic legal and religious sources.


But we plug our ears, drowning out our better judgment with counsel from apologists for Islam, flimflam men who, like carnival hawkers, are adept at misdirecting attention away from the Islamic doctrinal motivations behind what is a global jihad, waged both openly (violently) and more subtly, to advance the influence of Sharia in the world. Indeed, we become apologists and flimflam men, too. Or maybe we just don't care. "If it's legal, the building owners have a right to do what they want," said a spokesman for New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg.

If it's "legal"? What if it mocks the dead?

Maybe we deserve such a mosque at Ground Zero. It will serve as the perfect monument to post-9/11 America, a shining reproach to a nation that long ago capitulated through loss, or worse, absence of will. Not that it will be widely seen that way. Aside from the torment and seething of survivors, both family and professional family of the 9/11 dead, aside from blog noise and tabloid venting, the phony narrative of Cordoba House as a kind of healing outreach center -- pure deception -- appears ready for chiseling into stone. And that's not because Cordoba's flimflamming Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf obfuscates everything negative about Islam (jihad, for instance), and promotes everything antithetical to Western liberty (Sharia), often with jarring Western references. ("To Muslim ears," he writes, "Sharia law means ... the conditions necessary for what Americans call the pursuit of happiness.") That is, it's not only the efforts of Imam Rauf that are the problem. It's because nearly nine years after 9/11, we are still stupid enough to buy them. Continued...

[Valin]

Do We Deserve a Mosque at Ground Zero?

 

Why not?

 

Diana West...one of the Nuke Mecca crowd's favorites

[Valin]

Can't think of better news for OBL and the Jihadists than blocking this Mosque.

 

 

But we plug our ears, drowning out our better judgment with counsel from apologists for Islam, flimflam men who, like carnival hawkers, are adept at misdirecting attention away from the Islamic doctrinal motivations behind what is a global jihad, waged both openly (violently) and more subtly, to advance the influence of Sharia in the world. Indeed, we become apologists and flimflam men, too. Or maybe we just don't care. "If it's legal, the building owners have a right to do what they want," said a spokesman for New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg.

 

If it's "legal"? What if it mocks the dead?

 

Does she mean the Muslims who worked in the WTC and died along with all the others there?

 

Scripture tells me not to call anyone a fool, so I will say Diana West exhibits many of the qualities normally associated with a foolish person.

[righteousmomma]

Do We Deserve a Mosque at Ground Zero?

 

No.

 

We do not deserve a Mosque being built anywhere in this land.

We do not deserve having Christian churches torn down and replaced by Mosques as has happened around the world. We do not deserve having Christian churches here in the U.S turned into Islamic centers.

We do not deserve being un -welcomed in Mosques.

We do not deserve having Christians barred from evangelizing and building in Muslim lands.

We do not deserve having Christians murdered and kicked out of Muslim controlled lands.

We do not deserve having the Gospel denied, corrupted and perverted.

We do not deserve being forced to accept a "religion" that denies the Grace and Love and Power of Almighty God as revealed ONLY in the Bible from Genesis to Revelation.

 

Btw, I am not of the "Nuke Mecca" crowd.

 

Knowing we often do get though what we do not deserve --do they have the human legal "right" to build the Mosque?

 

Sure.

Do they deserve that right?

 

Highly questionable from a purely Moral standpoint of Good and Evil.

[Valin]

Do We Deserve a Mosque at Ground Zero?

 

No.

 

We do not deserve a Mosque being built anywhere in this land.

We do not deserve having Christian churches torn down and replaced by Mosques as has happened around the world. We do not deserve having Christian churches here in the U.S turned into Islamic centers.

We do not deserve being un -welcomed in Mosques.

We do not deserve having Christians barred from evangelizing and building in Muslim lands.

We do not deserve having Christians murdered and kicked out of Muslim controlled lands.

We do not deserve having the Gospel denied, corrupted and perverted.

We do not deserve being forced to accept a "religion" that denies the Grace and Love and Power of Almighty God as revealed ONLY in the Bible from Genesis to Revelation.

 

Btw, I am not of the "Nuke Mecca" crowd.

 

Knowing we often do get though what we do not deserve --do they have the human legal "right" to build the Mosque?

 

Sure.

Do they deserve that right?

 

Highly questionable from a purely Moral standpoint of Good and Evil.

 

 

"Deserve" is Diana West term. Should it be built? (one mans opinion, freely given and worth almost that much) Sure, why not. For any number of reasons, one being as I posted earlier is by by not building it now it provides a gift to the Jihadists, ie. see they hate us, they are at war with islam, this is just like the crusades, join us in defense of Islam.

 

We do not deserve having Christian churches torn down and replaced by Mosques as has happened around the world. We do not deserve having Christian churches here in the U.S turned into Islamic centers.

We do not deserve being un -welcomed in Mosques.

We do not deserve having Christians barred from evangelizing and building in Muslim lands.

We do not deserve having Christians murdered and kicked out of Muslim controlled lands.

 

So because these things happen we should act the same way?

 

 

There are those (the Jihadists and the followers of Robert Spencer) who want to turn this into a religious war. To to Robert Spencer and his followers I say read some history and be careful what you ask for, you just might get it.

[righteousmomma]

So because these things happen we should act the same way?

 

Did I say anything about "act"?

 

 

There are those (the Jihadists and the followers of Robert Spencer) who want to turn this into a religious war. To to Robert Spencer and his followers I say read some history and be careful what you ask for, you just might get it.

 

Maybe, I wouldn't know. I don't follow such matters and people.

As for religious wars --part of human nature. Always been with us. Always will be.

[Argyle58]

Hannity had a segment on this subject on his television show last night. Pro and con guests, both were muslim. Supposedly, the Imam of this mosque is the son of a radical jihadist cleric in Pakistan. The "pro" guest (looked to be of Indian or souther Pakistani descent) says we shouldn't judge this man by his father's actions.

 

Why shouldn't we judge the potential of his actions by the environment in which he was raised, given that we know nothing else about him?

[Valin]

Hannity had a segment on this subject on his television show last night. Pro and con guests, both were muslim. Supposedly, the Imam of this mosque is the son of a radical jihadist cleric in Pakistan. The "pro" guest (looked to be of Indian or souther Pakistani descent) says we shouldn't judge this man by his father's actions.

 

Why shouldn't we judge the potential of his actions by the environment in which he was raised, given that we know nothing else about him?

 

Is there a link for the segment? Thanks in advance

[Argyle58]

Hannity had a segment on this subject on his television show last night. Pro and con guests, both were muslim. Supposedly, the Imam of this mosque is the son of a radical jihadist cleric in Pakistan. The "pro" guest (looked to be of Indian or souther Pakistani descent) says we shouldn't judge this man by his father's actions.

 

Why shouldn't we judge the potential of his actions by the environment in which he was raised, given that we know nothing else about him?

 

Is there a link for the segment? Thanks in advance

 

http://video.foxnews.com/v/4195470/mosque-madness

[Argyle58]

After watching the video again, with fewer distractions, this is even worse than I remembered.

[righteousmomma]

After watching the video again, with fewer distractions, this is even worse than I remembered.

Yes, it is.

Political correctness and humanism is gonna kill us all or at the very least enslave us.

[nickydog]

And yet that video is one reason why I keep turning off the TV. Opposing sides talking too loud, interrupting and then talking even louder, so that all it sounds like is an argument with no one listening.

[Pepper]

NO

 

 

 

 

Political correctness and humanism is gonna kill us all or at the very least enslave us. -- RightheousMomma! BUMP to that

[Valin]

After watching the video again, with fewer distractions, this is even worse than I remembered.

Yes, it is.

Political correctness and humanism is gonna kill us all or at the very least enslave us.

 

 

In this short clip I see the underlying problem for most people trying to a handle on the who what where when why of the GWOT.

On one side we see Brigitte Gabriel who says Islam is the problem, leading some to advocate a religious war against 1.5 Billion people, and a religion that's been around for over 1400 years.

 

 

On the other side you we see Mike Ghouse, who says, Problem? What Problem? There's no Problem with Islam.

 

Both are wrong, and are what I've come to expect in looking at the GWOT and Islam. 30 sound bites screaming and hollering, playing to your supporters.

 

Too Brigitte I would say...tone it down lady. Shouting and putting forth a black and white view gets us nowhere in understanding what's going on, it does however get you facetime on TV, which may be your goal, but at the end of the day only gives ammo to the Jihadists.

 

Too Mike I would say, weather or not you like it the men how flew those airplanes into the WTC were doing it in the name of Islam.....get a clue, you people have a problem.

 

Those who don't really look into this get is lots of heat, but very little light.

 

What I try to do is provide a little light. Way to much Robert Spencer and way to little Bernard Lewis on our side.

 

Now for a sensible realistic view.... H/T Peter Robinson's Uncommon Knowledge

The U.S. & the Middle East with Fouad Ajami: Chapter 5 of 5

Fouad Ajami discusses the nature of the threat of radical Islam.

[SrWoodchuck]

I'm going to say, "No, to a mosque near ground zero." for the following reasons:

 

Islam means "submission"....at least to 1.5 billion Muslims, it does. Whose submission? Like Christians, who are supposed to submit to the teachings of Christ? Yes and no, not only to God, or His teachings, but to the utterances, habits & lifestyle of a man that claimed the Angel Gabriel appeared to him & revealed God's word, around 700AD. It also means submission of those that do not believe his teachings. Even though they believe that Jews, Christians & Muslims all descended from a common forefather, Abraham; only Islam is the true religion. Submission may be made willingly, or by dhimmitude [payment to Islam for a tolerated existence-with very strict & ornate rules] or by the sword. Do I mean they'll hack off your head with a dull blade? They are encouraged to convert or kill in any way they can, "by land or sea" and by whatever means are available. I should say, in fairness, that not all Muslims act on the teachings of the Quran, but in Dar-Al-Islam [countries under Islam] Muslims espousing peace & co-existence are very rare, and preaching this message there would probably mean death. The belief is in a "lesser Jihad" & a "greater Jihad" and one is the struggle for Islamic belief from the heart, the other is war against all non-believers.

 

Jihad means "struggle".......to 1.5 billion Muslims, whether they "practice" it or not. The Imam of the mosque to be built is a member of the Muslim Brotherhood, from whom Al Qaeda sprung. The Muslim Brotherhood was formed by Hasan Al-Banna, in 1928. His treatise says,"...all Muslim's must make Jihad.....Jihad is "fard" [obligatory] to fight the enemies...Jihad is an obligation from Allah, on every Muslim..." and "The Imam must send a military expedition to Dar-Al-Harb [also known as, "House of War" or "Land not under Islam" as opposed to Dar-Al-Islam = "Land under Islam"]every year or once or twice a year....and the people must support him."

 

Taqiyya [or kitman] has it's origins in Sharia law from the Quran [3:28 & 16:106] and means dissimulation or religious deception. It means that deception is actively encouraged in Dar-Al-Harb [unneccessary in Dar-Al-Islam] and basically says that anything said or promised to a non-believer, need not be truthful, if it promotes the goal of Jihad, which is, submission of all lands to Islam.

 

Ottoman Turks [Muslims] in Armenia, suspended dhimma, in 1856 [payment to be allowed to live in a land under Islam] and in 1896, 250,000 Armenians were slaughtered. A Jihad was officially declared against Christians & non-believers in 1914, and in 1915, 1,500,000 Armenians were killed. 150,000 Greek Christians were killed in 1922, by Muslims, in Smyrna, off the coast of the Mediterranean....while Allied warships watched indifferently. This was less than a hundred years ago, not back in the Middle Ages.

 

Now the phrase,"Useful idiots" as we saw in the Hannity clip above. It is linked to Stalin, and his ethnic & political cleansing. This is from, Amil Imani [August 8, 2008] Muslim and American citizen & pro-Democracy activist:

"The most dangerous are the politically correct." "Beginning with Ali, the first Shiite Imam, son-in-law of Muhammad; who with another man, used guile to surround & conquer a Jewish enclave....then beheaded 700 Jewish men in front of the Prophet....and sold their families [women & children] into slavery.....and leading to and including the Ayatollah Khomeini, in 1979, who used the ruse of a 'call to Democracy,' to establish the Islamic government now ruling Iran..." and going to Alexis Debat, on a 2006 article from AmericanThinker [link below] titled,"Islam's Useful Idiots"........Debat also recognized Islam's centrality--as both the Middle East's primary source of political action & universal--that is encompassing every aspect of life. "We don't know where it starts or ends," he observed. Strangely however, he denied that the Muslim Brotherhood is 'religious', "...it's chiefly a political movement, not a party---a 'liberation' movement."

 

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

I consider Ground Zero to be hallowed ground, no less than Gettysburg, or any European, or Asian battleground. Innocent Americans & foreign nationals died at the hands of committed Muslim terrorists, that in their own minds & with the joyful acceptance & approval of a large number of the remaining 1.5 billion Muslims, believed they were performing Jihad. I also believe in American principles of religious freedom. All who wish to worship in peace, should be allowed. I would suggest that before construction of a mosque is allowed, a Catholic cathedral, a Jewish Temple, and Hindu, Buddhist and any other religion should be granted land & permits for building. Nothing has been done at Ground Zero for almost ten years.

 

IMHO-Nothing should be done, until all can be accomodated. Islam's footprint with it's mosque at Ground Zero, is a greater recruiting tool than telling them to wait. It says,"See how we knock down their center of business, kill their infidel populations, and see how Islam rises triumphant on the blood of their dead."

 

If they can't wait, or if they force this on us, then permits for a hog rendering plant should be issued for any parcel that abuts the mosque property.

 

 

Islam's Useful Idiots

[Valin]

SrWoodchuck

 

Your reply (and thank you) is an example of what I was talking about in a previous reply

 

Taqiyya

Arabic: 'at-taqiyya

Other spelling: taqiyah

 

In the Middle East, but especially Islam, the concealment of belief, as a method of self-protection. Taqiyya is allowed, and performed, when necessary to avoid death or injury to oneself or other Muslims. Taqiyya is mainly considered as a part of Shi'i theology or modern-day Islamism.

 

Taqiyya may be translated with 'fear' and 'caution'. It is closely related to the term katm or kitman, 'concealment'. Taqiyya is in many cases linked with regulations of how Muslims should act with non-Muslims.

The rules concerning the true intention of taqiyya are strict, and abusers of taqiyya will be punished by God.

The permission to conceal the faith is believed to be admitted by the Koran:

 

Koran sura 16: The Bee

108 ... unless it be one who is forced and whose heart is quiet in the faith...

 

Koran sura 3: Imran's house

27 ... If you hide that which is in your breasts, or if you show it, God knows it...

 

Some interpret Muhammad to have performed taqiyya, too, when migrating to Yathrib (later Madina) instead of risking his life staying in Mecca. This interpretation may seem doubtful, but has importance with Muslims in order to legitimize taqiyya. It must be stressed that the two Koran verses above seem to allow acts of taqiyya; they even seem to allow it indiscriminately, meaning that it is up to the individual to decide when it is fit to conceal all or parts of his/her faith.

Traditionally, a majority of Sunnis will not accept taqiyya, arguing that it is an expression of lack of faith in God. Yet, there are Sunni theologians who defend the use of taqiyya, stating that the faith in the heart is what counts, not outward expressions, like with the historian and theologian at-Tabari (dead 923).....(Snip)

 

 

 

I consider Ground Zero to be hallowed ground, no less than Gettysburg, or any European, or Asian battleground. Innocent Americans & foreign nationals died at the hands of committed Muslim terrorists, that in their own minds & with the joyful acceptance & approval of a large number of the remaining 1.5 billion Muslims, believed they were performing Jihad.

 

You're talking about at most 15% of the worlds Muslims.

 

 

Question, what do you think the Jihadists and their willing allies ie al jazeera, will do with stopping the building of this Mosque? You don't suppose (as I've mentioned before) that they will say...this is one more example that America is at war with Islam and and all Muslims need to join in the Jihad and fight against the infidels.

 

And if it gets built...it gives America one more example that we are not (to quote George W Bush) at war with Islam.

 

 

 

Catholic cathedral, a Jewish Temple, and Hindu, Buddhist and any other religion should be granted land & permits for building.

 

 

Agree.

[Geee]

The Ground Zero Mosque Developer: Muslim Brotherhood Roots, Radical Dreams

Everything there is to know about Faisal Abdul Rauf, the wolf in sheep's clothing behind the planned lower Manhattan mega-mosque.

 

 

May 14, 2010 - by Alyssa A. Lappen

 

The prospective developer of a $100 million, 13-story mosque 600 feet from Ground Zero presents himself as a Muslim moderate (1). Yet Kuwait-born Faisal Abdul Rauf also boasts of his issue from an “Egyptian family steeped in religious scholarship” (2). Indeed, Feisal Rauf’s Muslim Brotherhood provenance, radical by definition, is as authentic as it gets.

 

Rauf’s father, Dr. Muhammad Abdul Rauf (1917-2004) — an Egyptian contemporary of Muslim Brotherhood founder Hassan al-Banna — conveyed to Feisal his family’s long tradition of radicalism, which he acquired at Islam’s closest equivalent to the Vatican, Al-Azhar University. The elder Dr. Rauf studied and taught there before fleeing Egypt in 1948. That year, Feisal Abdul Rauf was born in Kuwait.

 

Feisal Rauf has planned for some time to further develop his father’s U.S. Islamic expansionism. In 1990, Rauf opened the tiny al-Farah Mosque at 245 West Broadway in lower Manhattan. Area residents did not even notice the mosque until 2006, when the New York State Liquor Authority (SLA) refused to license a new bar on the same block and started yanking others’ liquor licenses (3).

 

Rauf attended grammar school and high school in the UK and Malaysia, according to his biography. He probably first lived in America only in 1965, at age 17, when his father moved from Malaysia to New York to plan and head the Islamic Cultural Center (not built until the mid-1980s) (4). Rauf then obtained a BS in physics at Columbia University (5). In 1971, the family moved to Washington, D.C., where Rauf’s father headed the Islamic Center on Massachusetts Ave (6). His father, buried in Suitland, MD, at the for-profit Washington National Cemetery, also founded three Malaysian Islamic studies programs, including the International Islamic University of Malaysia (7).

 

Rauf’s early UK education and familiarization with American popular culture and values made him an acutely adept practitioner of Islamic taqiyya — deceptive speech and action to advance the interests and supremacy of Islam (8). To further that Islamic advancement, Rauf in 1997 established the American Society for Muslim Advancement (ASMA). His Kashmir-born wife Daisy Kahn, an interior designer by profession, has run the organization since 2005 (9).

 

Rauf then began cultivating new spheres of influence. In about summer 2002, Rauf started lecturing on Islam at the 750-acre southwestern New York campus of Chautauqua Institution, a 136-year-old non-profit where religion director Joan Brown Campbell took Rauf under her wing. Under the rubric of the “Abrahamic” faiths, a convenient cover for Rauf’s Islamic activities, Campbell subsequently named him the prospective head of a Muslim house now planned on campus by another Rauf brainchild — the 501(3)c organization Muslim Friends of Chautauqua. Rauf also befriended Karen Armstrong, the former British nun and devotee of Islam.

 

In summer 2002, as a “theologian in residence,” Armstrong advocated for the Muslim Brotherhood — as if the father of all Islamic terrorist organizations was a progressive charity:

 

[The MB] set up a wonderful welfare program before it was suppressed. … Factories where Muslims could work, had time for prayers, had vacation time, insurance, [learned] labor laws, [provided] clinics, they taught people how to treat sewage, drainage, and it was always the religions response to try to help modernity to give to the ordinary people the benefits of modernity in an Islamic setting that made sense to them and made things more balanced (10).

 

In 2003, Rauf befriended leaders of Denver’s Aspen Institute, including former executive director and four-term Aspen mayor John S. Bennet. In 2004, under ASMA auspices, Rauf organized a meeting of 125 young Muslims and formed Muslim Leaders of Tomorrow. With Bennet’s help, he co-founded the Cordoba Initiative in Aspen, purportedly to “improve” Muslim-West relations (11). Rauf gets funding from a variety of other liberal organizations, including, for example, Gloria Steinem’s Ms. Foundation.

 

However, Rauf directly contradicted his conciliatory behavior with a firebrand interview with the Sydney Morning Herald. Terrorism, he stated, will end only when the West acknowledges the harm it has done to Muslims:

 

http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/the-ground-zero-mosque-developer-muslim-brotherhood-roots-radical-dreams/

[SrWoodchuck]

Valin! I thank you for your reply & I appreciate being able to learn from someone as well read & knowledgeable as you.

 

First, I make no pretense about my lack of knowledge regarding Islam, and from that standpoint, beg your forgiveness for any factual and historical mistakes I've made. A little knowledge is a dangerous thing......

 

Concerning your interpretation of taqiyya, I agree that when Muhammad was vulnerable, he advocated it's use, as any good military commander would.

 

Which brings me to a point of discussion. We in the western world, who manage to pick up a translation of the Quran are left bewildered by it's meaning because of a principle called "abrogation." Al-naskh wa al-mansukh [the abrogating & the abrogated], the principle directs that verses revealed later in Muhammad's career in Medina, "abrogate" or overrule those passages revealed earlier, in Mecca. The Quran itself lays out the principle of abrogation in 2:106-"Whatever a verse [revelation] do We {Allah} abrogate or cause to be forgotten, we bring a better one, or similiar to it. Know you not that Allah is able to do all things?" From what I've learned , 2:106 was revealed in skepticism directed at Muhammad, that Allah's revelation was not always consistent over time. Muhammad's rebuttal was that "Allah is able to do all things!"- even change His mind. The Meccan suras, revealed when Muhammad & Muslims were vulnerable, are generally benign. Later Medinan suras, revealed when Muhammad rode at the head of an army, are bellicose.

 

Example:

[From earlier Meccan period] Sura 109:6- "To you be your religion, and to me be my religion [islamic Monotheism]

 

[From the later Medinan period-close to Muhammad's death] Sura 9:5- "Then when the Sacred Months have passed [the 1st, 7th, 11th & 12th months of the Islamic calender], then kill the Mushriken [unbelievers] wherever you may find them, and capture them, and besiege them, and prepare for them each & every ambush. But if they repent & perform Iqamat-as-Salat [the Islamic Ritual Prayers] and give alms, then leave their way free."

 

Then there's the fact that historically, examples of taqiyya include permission to renounce Islam itself, to save one's neck or ingratiate yourself to an enemy. Kitman is more of a mental reservation, allowing a person to give half-truths or omit truth as needed.

 

Doesn't this make communication between Dar-al-Islam & Dar-al-Harb [especially negotiated settlements & agreements] almost impossible?

 

Also, I don't know how you arrived at the 15% of 1.5 billion Muslims, which is still 225,000,000 adherents of "Greater Jihad," but, be that as it may, I do not wish to lump the rest of the Muslim world with the few that wish us harm. I'm really not against the mosque, but think they need to have their permit delayed, until other religions are allowed to begin construction. It should be explained that it is not denied to them, only postponed. Other religions should be actively courted to complete their construction ASAP & should be given every deferrence by city, state & federal governments; but absolutely no funding, except private donations. If Muslims want to contribute to what will essentially be a National Religious Monument to victims of 9-11, in building the other religion's houses of worship, they should be allowed.

 

I'm a frog, in a pot.....the water was cold....but it's getting hot....am I alert or a dupe....just a happy warm frog......or froggy soup?

[nickydog]

I don't understand a lot of what you guys are saying, but I don't want a mosque at ground zero. It would be like pouring salt in a wound.

[righteousmomma]

I have had a fun night with neighbors and one thing from conversation became clear: honest and good people will disagree.

If anyone reads the Koran objectively and yet from a Western Christian view point one thing is clear: we will never agree.

Our Christianity tells us we should not agree.

[Valin]

SrWoodchuck

 

Just trying to spread some light.

 

The Who, What, Where, When, Why, How of the GWOT has been my obsession since....That Day.

 

 

My point is and has been for some time now this war is a battle of ideas, and will be won on that front...ie ideological. Anything that gives ammunition to our enemies is counter productive. At the end of the day this war a war over the 85-90% of the worlds Muslims.

I really do understand what people are saying about this and why they are saying it, and wish the plan to build this mosque had not happened, but that's water under the bridge at this point. Time to make lemonade.

[Valin]

I have had a fun night with neighbors and one thing from conversation became clear: honest and good people will disagree.

If anyone reads the Koran objectively and yet from a Western Christian view point one ting is clear: we will never agree.

Our Christianity tells us we should not agree.

 

 

Can't talk about others but I'm not looking for agreement, all I'm looking for is not flying airplanes into our buildings.

Do I wish, hope, pray that everyone was a Christian? Absolutely! Two points....1. Not gonna happen, 2. Should not be the goal of the government.

 

 

What we should be trying to do is promote a counter-reformation in Islam (The Salafist/Islamis/Jihadist/Khomeinists have already started the reformation).

[righteousmomma]

valin

Do I wish, hope, pray that everyone was a Christian? Absolutely! Two points....1. Not gonna happen, 2. Should not be the goal of the government.

 

 

Totally agree.

 

I also know that placating them only enables them because they see us as weak.

Flying planes in our buildings was long planned as was the earlier world trade bombing. We had done nothing.

Their aim and goal is world domination and the downfall of "The Great Satan" and against that there is no defense except alert strength.

Their government is a theocracy in world view.

[Valin]

valin

Do I wish, hope, pray that everyone was a Christian? Absolutely! Two points....1. Not gonna happen, 2. Should not be the goal of the government.

 

 

Totally agree.

 

I also know that placating them only enables them because they see us as weak.

Flying planes in our buildings was long planned as was the earlier world trade bombing. We had done nothing.

Their aim and goal is world domination and the downfall of "The Great Satan" and against that there is no defense except alert strength.

Their government is a theocracy in world view.

 

 

define "They"

[pollyannaish]

I think one of the toughest things about a war like this one is that we are fighting it in two completely different paradigms. For militant Islam, this is a holy war. For us it is a war to protect free will and freedom.

 

I have not watched the video because yelling is completely counter productive. But from reading the comments it seems to me that the important part about this is that we build BOTH a church and a mosque and any other religious houses of worship in this spot.

 

We can not accept JUST a mosque, because symbolically it would allow the mosque to become a "flag" on the top of the hill they'd conquered. "We destroyed the infidel, we planted a mosque to the deity we serve in it's place." From a holy war context (for which this appears to be for the very active and aggressive 15% of Islam) that would be a symbol of conquering us.

 

On the other hand, this war is a secular one for us. We are fighting for the right for pluralism and the ability of those with different faiths and belief systems to live side by side peacefully. If we build both Islamic and Christian facilities, and perhaps Jewish and those of Eastern religions in this place, we have demonstrated that their attack does not change our core principles of freedom.

 

For me that's the key. IF the Mosque is instead of or the only house of worship, NO WAY. If it is part of many houses of worship on a sacred spot in our country as a representation of freedom there should absolutely be a seat at the table (so to speak.)

 

I'm with Valin on this: I will spread the gospel of Christ as far and wide as I can. But I will also defend the freedom of those to CHOOSE in whom and what they believe. We do not fight Islam. We fight the loss of our FREEDOM.