Obama backs mosque near ground zero

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estesbob said:
I would like it far enough away that the 9/11 survivors are comfortable with it. Several offer had been mades to assist in building a mosque further way and nobody has complained about a mosque itself being built, per se. Yet the supporters of this mosque continue to try to paint anybody who opposes the mosque being built this close to Ground Zero as being religious bigots. They also continue to assert that the 9/11 survivors just need to get over it and should have absolutely no ill feelings about Muslims.
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Did these specific muslims have anything to do with 9/11?..No
Have these muslims done anything wrong?..No
Have these muslims broken the law?..No
Is it a terrorist training camp?..No
Are muslims our scapegoats?..You bet

You can’t see the building from ground zero nor can you see the ground zero from the building. It isn’t even an actual Mosque. There’s a real Mosque only 4 blocks from grown zero. Not only do the relatives of the 9/11 victims need to move on with their lives, this whole country needs to get over it and move on. It happened, there’s no going back and there’s no point in blaming muslims who live in new york for it.

We spend billions in iraq and afghanastan and kill off thousands in the name of helping muslims but then we can’t even allow them to use a building that hasn’t been occupied since airplane landing gear blew through the roof and will otherwise remain abandoned?

Oh yeah, here’s a fun face. Innocent muslims died on 9/11 as well.

The problem here is you don’t just blame the people who did it. You blame their entire culture and religion.
 
estesbob said:
That’s exactly what I was thinking when I read your post.
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At least there were actual points in mine, points you seem unable/unwilling to address…so you just lump me into the ‘whoever disagrees with me is a bigot’ category. Unfortunately, I have, from birth, stubbornly refused to be pigeon-holed.
 
Grace & Peace!
estesbob said:
Yet the supporters of this mosque continue to try to paint anybody who opposes the mosque being built this close to Ground Zero as being religious bigots.
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Then what’s the basis for opposing the Park 51 community center if fear of Islam plays no part in it?

Just curious…

Under the Mercy,
Mark

All is Grace and Mercy! Deo Gratias!
 
seekerz said:
Most people I listen to do not paint all (only some) of the opposers as bigots. How far away will the 911 survivors be ‘comfortable’ with? Who speaks for the 911 survivors and are they all in agreement? I have seen at least 3 in the last few days (one a Muslim first responder), who publicly say that they have no problem with the mosque being where it is. Maybe we need to poll them first before purporting to speak for them…

As for the last part of your post, no one can tell someone how to grieve, but it is well documented that forgiveness is a great part of healing. Of course forgiveness can be seen as optional or impossible depending on one’s faith and one’s point of view… I’m not an expert on world religions but I can’t seem to find more than one that absolutely requires it.
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I don’t know how far away the mosque should to be. However the people that oppose the mosque have made repeated offers to sit down with the developers and find a solution that is amenable to everyone. Thus far they had been met only with blanket denunciations that they are religious bigots for even asking a

It’s all well and good to claim that the 9/11 survivors need to get over it and need to forgive. Part of tgetting over something and finding forgiveness is an acknowledgment that their feelings are legitimate and to show some empathy for the situation they are in. When you have two thirds of the people opposing something you simply cannot write it off as being due to bigotry and or animosity
 
Deo_Volente said:
Grace & Peace!

Then what’s the basis for opposing the Park 51 community center if fear of Islam plays no part in it?

Just curious…

Under the Mercy,
Mark

All is Grace and Mercy! Deo Gratias!
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After 626 post I cannot believe anybody is still asking that question. We have had 9/11 survivors post to this group and give us their heartfelt reasons. Two thirds of the people in this country agree with them.
 
seekerz said:
At least there were actual points in mine, points you seem unable/unwilling to address…so you just lump me into the ‘whoever disagrees with me is a bigot’ category. Unfortunately, I have, from birth, stubbornly refused to be pigeon-holed.
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How does one refute the
I’ve tried to see both sides in this debate but I’ve had it. The level of ignorance and bigotry I’m seeing the last few days is astounding and shameful
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“point”? I’m sure there are **some ** opposed to the mosque at this location who base their argument on ignorance or bigotry, but it is unfair to lump people in this category. Yes, it is a conentious issue, and passions are high, but this kind of invective does nothing to move towards a solution.
 
estesbob said:
I don’t know how far away the mosque should to be. However the people that oppose the mosque have made repeated offers to sit down with the developers and find a solution that is amenable to everyone. Thus far they had been met only with blanket denunciations that they are religious bigots for even asking a

It’s all well and good to claim that the 9/11 survivors need to get over it and need to forgive. Part of tgetting over something and finding forgiveness is an acknowledgment that their feelings are legitimate and to show some empathy for the situation they are in. When you have two thirds of the people opposing something you simply cannot write it off as being due to bigotry and or animosity
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It’s also easy to say what the victims’ families should do or how they should react to this situation. But how many of us can really put ourselves in their shoes? To know that your loved ones died horribly and unnecessarily and then be told that it’s time to forgive and forget?
 
estesbob said:
I don’t know how far away the mosque should to be. However the people that oppose the mosque have made repeated offers to sit down with the developers and find a solution that is amenable to everyone. Thus far they had been met only with blanket denunciations that they are religious bigots for even asking a
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I’m not sure I heard about the offers until after the hateful signs and shouting began. Putting it in simply human terms, I have something you want to change…I might be persuaded if you come sit down and have an amiable face to face chat, but not if your friends and supporters first come charging angrily into my yard.
It’s all well and good to claim that the 9/11 survivors need to get over it and need to forgive. Part of tgetting over something and finding forgiveness is an acknowledgment that their feelings are legitimate and to show some empathy for the situation they are in. When you have two thirds of the people opposing something you simply cannot write it off as being due to bigotry and or animosity
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Maybe polling wasn’t quite as advanced then as it is now, but I’m fairly certain there were at various times of history, large majorities who supported such issues as the internment of the Japanese, which today are clearly seen as wrong. Might (as in numbers) doesn’t always make right.

The point is that some people feel genuinely upset over the prospect of a mosque near ground zero but the way it’s being handled (I actually think their pain is being used for political gain) is not correct. There is an element in this country’s present politics that plays to and legitimizes certain deep seated fears that people hold.

I don’t blame those who fear - maybe they have reason, maybe they can’t help it, mabye they don’t know any bettter - I blame those who propagate and whip up that fear into an incoherent frenzy which is basically what I see happening now and it’s not just against Muslims either. If I had to choose something to fear today in our society, it would be this phenomenon of fear-baiting which threatens to tear at the fabric that holds us together.
 
Grace & Peace!
estesbob said:
It’s all well and good to claim that the 9/11 survivors need to get over it and need to forgive.
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The difficulty here is that the people behind this center and the community they wish to serve (which is broader than just Muslims, by the way) were not involved in the WTC attacks. The 9/11 survivors’ and families’ forgiveness is immaterial here. They have no need to forgive these people–they didn’t do anything wrong, and it does no one any justice to carry on this conversation as if they did.
estesbob said:
Part of tgetting over something and finding forgiveness is an acknowledgment that their feelings are legitimate and to show some empathy for the situation they are in.
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But are they sensitive about Muslims or sensitive about terrorism? Is it that they can’t get over an act of terrorism, or that they can’t get over the existence of the Islamic religion? Empathizing is one thing, validating feelings is one thing, enabling irrationality is another.

I suspect that the survivors and their families are pawns in a larger political game. It’s inevitable that they would be (and that they have been!), so it shouldn’t come as too much of a surprise, sad as it may be. There are dimensions of this conversation that are being glossed over or forgotten because dealing with them is more difficult. This whole debate over Park 51 is about political opportunism in an election year. It has nothing whatsover to do with the survivors and families. Nothing.
estesbob said:
When you have two thirds of the people opposing something you simply cannot write it off as being due to bigotry and or animosity
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In general, I think that you embark on very dangerous territory when you claim that a majority cannot be bigotted because it is a majority. History and politics simply do not bear that claim out.

Unfortunately, it is part of who we are to identify scapegoats and assassinate them. That’s what we do as individuals, or as majorities. Part of Christ’s work on the cross was done to put an end to such things–that is, Christ, God himself, chooses to identify with the outcast, the other, the scapegoat so that whenever we come to the time and place in which we’re itching to find a new scapegoat, we will find God there in our victim’s place. This is something that we, as Christians, often forget. I know I do.

Under the Mercy,
Mark

All is Grace and Mercy! Deo Gratias!
 
livnlern said:
It’s also easy to say what the victims’ families should do or how they should react to this situation. But how many of us can really put ourselves in their shoes? To know that your loved ones died horribly and unnecessarily and then be told that it’s time to forgive and forget?
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Who’s doing the telling? That’s the issue for us as Catholics and as Christians.
 
Deo_Volente said:
In general, I think that you embark on very dangerous territory when you claim that a majority cannot be bigotted because it is a majority. History and politics simply do not bear that claim out.

Unfortunately, it is part of who we are to identify scapegoats and assassinate them. That’s what we do as individuals, or as majorities. Part of Christ’s work on the cross was done to put an end to such things–that is, Christ, God himself, chooses to identify with the outcast, the other, the scapegoat so that whenever we come to the time and place in which we’re itching to find a new scapegoat, we will find God there in our victim’s place. This is something that we, as Christians, often forget. I know I do.

Under the Mercy,
Mark

All is Grace and Mercy! Deo Gratias!
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Priceless, nothing I could even dream of adding to that…👍
 
scipio337 said:
How does one refute the

“point”? I’m sure there are **some ** opposed to the mosque at this location who base their argument on ignorance or bigotry, but it is unfair to lump people in this category. Yes, it is a conentious issue, and passions are high, but this kind of invective does nothing to move towards a solution.
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You may have noticed that I was responding to a post/s (which reflects a lot of what I’ve heard lately in this debate) which was all about the fear of being destroyed from the inside (of course with the help of the insider who’s really and outsider :rolleyes:)…and I did use the word “some”, so the question of lumping is really irrelevant. It’s not a question these days of how many but how loudly they shout. BTW, bigot, like racist, is not an invective, it’s a specific description for particular patterns of behavior.
 
estesbob said:
Of course not-since it plays in your scenario that only bigots could disagree with you on this issue.
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My contributions today started with a response to a post within, shall we say a sub-thread of this conversation, that I found particularly distasteful in its implications. Interestingly, the poster has not been back on yet to respond/refute my post but you seem to be jumping in without any context whatsoever. Matters not, you will believe what you like about me but I will not wear any label I have not earned and I do not believe that all those who disagree with me are bigots. Any protestations by you to the contrary are simply, how shall I put it delicately? Misrepresentations.
 
The one thing that occurs to me is that if the President (or any other governmental official) voiced his support of a Christian house of worship, then everyone would go crazy stating that his public support was a consitutional violation of the separation of church and state. Of course it would not be, BUT I guarantee that if this were a catholic, baptist, lutheran, etc church rather than a mosque, the ACLU (at a minimum) would make something out of it. Why is it that the only religion that we cannot support openly without scrutiny and complaint is Christianity?
 
Grace & Peace!
estesbob said:
Of course not-since it plays in your scenario that only bigots could disagree with you on this issue.
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I’m not saying you’re bigots if you don’t agree with me or people who share my views on this. But I haven’t seen an argument against the community center that doesn’t include an element of fear. That’s all. Is there an argument against the center that you can articulate that doesn’t include fear–fear of offending someone, fear of Islam, fear that we won’t be able to control ourselves and we might become violent, fear that someone else might become violent… It’s all fear. To get ourselves out of the fear, we’re going to have to find someone or something that we can put it on, that can carry it for us out into the wilderness so we don’t have to see it or deal with it. The candidates are many: the people who call us bigots, the people who we think are bigots, the Muslims who started this, the families and survivors of the 9/11 attacks, the politicians using the situation for their own political gain… Someone’s going to have to pay, eventually. That’s how scapegoating and cycles of violence generally work. And that’s how this discussion is being played out here in this thread, in the media, in the world. I’m guilty of it, too–I blamed the politicians, remember?

Is there an actual argument against the center that doesn’t include fear, that doesn’t participate in the whole scapegoating process? That avoids it entirely? Are there land use issues? Are there corruption issues? Have there been criminal real estate deals behind closed doors? Is a law being broken?

I don’t think you’re a bigot. I think we’re all caught up in an unfortunate process that should be all too familiar to all of us.

Under the Mercy,
Mark

All is Grace and Mercy! Deo Gratias!
 
mymarcy said:
The one thing that occurs to me is that if the President (or any other governmental official) voiced his support of a Christian house of worship, then everyone would go crazy stating that his public support was a consitutional violation of the separation of church and state. Of course it would not be, BUT I guarantee that if this were a catholic, baptist, lutheran, etc church rather than a mosque, the ACLU (at a minimum) would make something out of it. Why is it that the only religion that we cannot support openly without scrutiny and complaint is Christianity?
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Without scrutiny and complaint? Do you own a TV or access news via the internet? There is absolutely nothing that this President does that is received without scrutiny and complaint and that includes his remarks about the right of Muslims to build a mosque near ground zero.
 
estesbob said:
Of course not-since it plays in your scenario that only bigots could disagree with you on this issue.
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No, we’ve been saying all along that the opposition sounds bigoted. It may not be the intent of the opposition. However, once they realize that they are being insensitive towards Muslims, it is up to them to change their minds or willfully persist in prejudice.
 
seekerz said:
At least there were actual points in mine, points you seem unable/unwilling to address…so you just lump me into the ‘whoever disagrees with me is a bigot’ category. Unfortunately, I have, from birth, stubbornly refused to be pigeon-holed.
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Right, and even if your conclusion is “everyone who disagrees is a bigot” it does not invalidate your conclusion. If my position was “Women deserve voting rights” then everyone who disagreed would probably be bigoted. Until the opposition comes back with “no, here is a bona-fide rationale for our opposition” they do in fact sound prejudiced.
 
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