I'm thinking you must be jesting. "trivial bits of information." ?? are you being funny/sarcastic?

ty Suebee
 

ahhh...thank God, for a minute there....lol.

I know that there are 'radicals', nut-jobs, of every kind, case and point--->right-wingnut-christians! These folks do and have done more damage than any Mosque anywhere will ever do.

If we say NO! to the building of the Mosque, then we must say NO! to any Church being built anywhere (following the nut-bags' logic), because Lord knows how much death and destruction has been been committed and sanctioned by the "Christians". (read some books on the history of the Christian movement). I used to call myself a Christian, but these radicalChristians, give God/Christ a bad name. If they're really CHRISTians, why are they being so UN-Christ like.
Here's the deal, they are NOT CHRISTians, if they were, they would look more like CHRIST, instead of a bunch of fear and hate mongers.
So you see, there are nut-jobs of every faith, not just the Muslims or someone else we don't agree with. Don't just swallow what people tell you, not even FOX & FREAKS, Palin...etc, use the brain the good Lord gave you. Think for yourself, reason, educate yourself, discuss, be open minded..there are other points of view just as valid as yours, perhaps (if you humble yourself) more so. Why do these self-righteous people(fear&hate mongers) think God died and left themin charge of every body's life, when they can't even manage their own hypocrisy.
I say, let the Muslims have their building.
The rest of you Palins and Becks and Rushs..go get some humility and look up the word HYPOCRISY. And instead of proclaiming that YOU are a CHRISTIAN, how about actually LIVING AND ACTING LIKE A CHRISTian.

No I was actually very serious......laughin....

seriously I was being sarcastic.....msdemeanor and I are old lefty friends.........


besides...........in this crowd had I been serious my ass would be flaming big time...........laughin

Hey, we can count on Toughy for this.... way serious informed, lefty. Sometimes I get so crazed by what is going on, a little humor of any kind helps!

Personally, I believe we have enough churches of every type and would love to see more schools, hospitals, etc. being built. I am spiritual and have some left over churchy-stuff and honor anyone's religion, but, as one GOP congressperson said.. COME ON! Yes, I'm being a smartass. Sometimes the tax breaks relgious organizations and churches get, plus the amount of private funds thrown their way and the state of our social services, I get really pissed.

I am so tired of the ME, ME, MINE set of so many in the US.

Just mulling something over...

Would there be a difference to the anti-Islamic factions, if the planned prayer room (it is NOT a Mosque!!) were taken out of the equation? Just a community center for Muslim folks, without a room designated for prayer? Frankly, I think not. This BS would have been the same if the proposed plans did not have this as part of the construction goals.

Also, I have taken part in many events, etc. in community centers of all kinds. Some religious, some not. Most have some kind of prayer room in them, and many are non-sectarian- just a room for quiet contemplation and some privacy. Even in centers that were built by a particular religion, prayer rooms were open for anyone of any religion (or none) to use. Hospitals with no religious ties also have such rooms or chapels which are open to all.

Frankly, most types of municipal community-based organizational structures have to follow codes and ordinances based within their municipality and cannot stop anyone from using their facilities as long as dues, etc. are paid and rules followed. A Catholic or Baptist can utilize gym equipment, rent facilities for an event, etc. in a community center of another faith.

Hummmmm... I have given myself some more homework as to finding out if in fact this prayer room would be open to any person, including non-Muslims (having a quiet, meditative space in a large noisy city is a good thing for any of us, I believe)?

Argh... where do I look into NYC ordinances for this kind of structure and organization? Just because it is being constructed by a particular religion, does not mean it will serve only that population.

Trying to focus on the community in the community center concept, here!

European Islamophobia Finds A Home In The U.S.

Reza Aslan is a contributing editor at The Daily Beast. He is the author of No God But God and Beyond Fundamentalism.

You may have heard the ad put out by the National Republican Trust Political Action Committee: "On Sept. 11, they declared war against us. And to celebrate that murder of 3,000 Americans, they want to build a monstrous 13-story mosque at ground zero."

Did you catch that? They attacked us on 9/11, and now they want to build a mosque at ground zero.

This is what has become of the debate over the construction of an Islamic community center in Lower Manhattan. You know, the so-called mosque at ground zero that's neither a mosque nor at ground zero.

No matter what your feelings are about the proposed community center, there can be little doubt that Islamophobia is on the rise in America.
A Washington Post poll released last year found that nearly half of Americans — 48 percent — have an unfavorable view of Islam. That's nine points higher than in the months after the Sept. 11 attacks. A new national survey by the Pew Research Center found that 30 percent of those who disapprove of President Obama's job performance believe he is Muslim.

What's more disturbing is that anti-Muslim sentiment seems to have gone mainstream, with fringe groups like Stop Islamization of America — which is behind many of the protests in lower Manhattan and has been participating in similar anti-Muslim rallies across the country — suddenly receiving regular air time on mainstream media outlets.

Stop Islamization of America is actually an affiliate of a European organization called Stop Islamization of Europe, an anti-Muslim hate group whose motto is "Racism is the lowest form of human stupidity, but Islamophobia is the height of common sense."

The connection between the two organizations is telling.
In Europe, the passage of laws curtailing the rights and freedoms of Muslims and the success of avowedly anti-Islam political parties have led to a sense of marginalization and disenfranchisement among Europe's Muslim communities. That in turn has led to what I believe is a sharp increase in radicalization among Europe's young Muslims.

For years, scholars like myself who've studied these radicalization trends have confidently argued that the kind of institutionalized Islamophobia one sees in large parts of Europe could never take hold in the U.S. That America's unbreakable dedication to religious liberties would never allow anti-Muslim sentiment to become mainstream. That, in fact, America's Muslim community — educated, prosperous, moderate and integrated into every level of American society — may be our nation's greatest weapon in fighting the ideology of radical extremism.

It seems we were wrong. The same kind of Islamophobia that has made much of Europe inhospitable to its Muslim citizens is now threatening to seize the U.S.

he fear is that this may lead to the same kind of radicalization among Muslim youth in the U.S. that we've seen in Europe. It has already played into the hands of al-Qaida, which has for years been trying to convince American Muslims that the unfettered religious freedoms they enjoy is a mirage — that the U.S. will eventually turn against its Muslim citizens. Are we in danger of proving al-Qaida right?

I am a liberal, progressive, secularized American Muslim. But when I see that bigotry against my faith — my very identity — has become so commonplace in America that it is shaping into a wedge issue for the midterm elections, I can barely control my anger.

I can't imagine how the next generation of American Muslim youth will react to such provocations. I pray that we never find out.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/s...ryId=129381552

Atlasthome,
Whether or not there is a prayer hall (of course there will be) isn't the issue. The scared folks who've watched too much Fox news are terrified that these folks are going to use their community meeting rooms to plan attacks on innocent Americans.

To answer your question, however, a mosque prayer hall is open to anyone at all so long as they observe proper Islamic etiquette, i.e., women covering their hair and dressed modestly and men observing the Islamic dress code for their gender. In fact, I'm sure anyone would be welcomed and given a free Quran for their visit :-).

Did you know that travelers in other countries stop overnight in mosques sometimes. Nobody asks if they are Muslim. People even stop in to have an afternoon nap on the carpets without raising an eye brow.

Sad fact is that our media has inundated us with a lot of B.S. about one of the world's major religions -- made these folks out to be terrorists and Al Qada sympathizers. How soon we forget about the Christian Crusades and the Inquisition and the persecution of the Jews of Europe, of course.

It's unlikely that we shall have the whole and accurate story of what happened on 911 in any of our lifetimes.

Take away the constitutional rights of one faction of people in America and rest assured that there's no going to be a lot of empathy for the rights demanded by gay people.

Once upon a time, long ago, on another website, at a Bash, there was an announced POC only gathering.. No non-POC allowed including non-POC partners of POCs...........in other words...........no white folk allowed....

ya would have thought the POC only gathering had a specific purpose to plot, plan and implement the take-over of the entire website, plus the entire world. Why arent us whitey allowed? What are you gonna talk about whitey can't hear? OMG you are planning to kill all white folk and take over the world !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

dang............POC got together and the fucking world continued to turn and global climate change did not hesitate in it's march toward disastrous change for all human beings........... including those rich mother fucking white men who control money...........

Thank you so much for this information!

I have been thinking a lot about this (why I posted earlier) because there are many centers that have a specific religious afiliation that are open to all. And it seems to me that requiring respect and observance to the religion at hand is just not a big deal and is usual and customary. Way back as a Catholic student involved in Newman Center organizations on college campuses, the prayer room or someties called a chapel was open to anyone visiting our center. We also had accomodations for overnight travelers, too. They didn't have to be Catholic at all.

These centers were far more liberal than regular Catholic parishes, but the idea was about community interaction within and outside of the catholic faith. There were requirements then, too, but many of the prior kinds of things like women having to cover their heads during a Mass were no longer observed and women were deacons and alter girls. Not the church of my parents and grandparents! Actually, there are many, many traditional Catholic rituals and requirements of women in the past that don't differ much from some of what a woman would be subjected to in an Islamic mosque. I don't agree with any of this with either religion (it's about patriarchal tenets for me), but, what is important here is the fact that a center such as this with a prayer room is open to anyone of any faith- or those not having a faith at all.

Gee, kind of knocks the whacko's fear of all those Islamic people gathering without the rest of us being allowed in to plot against us, doesn't it?

Thanks, again.

Hmmmmm, Baptist extremists can be fairly daunting too, ya' know.

The little cosmic joke is that Islam and Judaism are fundamentally the same Abrahamic faith. The only real differences are that Muslims acknowledge Jesus (Issa) as a prophet and messiah (not the son of G/d) and consider, of course, Prophet Muhammed as a genuine prophet. Basically the same laws govern both faiths and neither faith gives more rights to women than another. Christianity, of course, is also an Abrahamic faith at its core and women are admonished to "keep silent in the church". So, in which faith (as it is generally practiced) does a woman stand the best chance? Probably the answer would be none of the above.

Nonetheless, we must respect the right of people to make their own choices as to their beliefs and interpretation, so long as they don't directly affect our own right to liberty.

If one chooses to bow down to Humpty Dumpty and their life is more meaningful having done so, G/d bless 'em. Just don't force me to follow suit.

I am so tired that I must respond to all of your interpretations regarding
this threads topic when I find more time.
I will say you seem to be generalizing many groups of different peoples.
And of course being Bipolar The words "nut-jobs" and "nut-bags" jumped right off your post at me since I abhor those words.
Do you feel you are living and acting as a Christian? Or a "fear and hate" monger yourself in this post?

"be open minded..there are other points of view just as valid as yours, perhaps (if you humble yourself) more so." I look forward to your open mindedness when I post.

I find it interesting that you assume I am overtly triggered by certain words yet you seem triggered by your own words thinking it was I that was using them when they were quoted from your own posts.

"Do you feel you are living and acting as a Christian? Or a "fear and hate" monger yourself in this post?

"be open minded..there are other points of view just as valid as yours, perhaps (if you humble yourself) more so." I look forward to your open mindedness when I post."

The above is your own thoughts I quoted in my last post.

And no, I do not think IMO that a Proposed Mosque Near Ground Zero is appropriate. And I try not to be a hypocrite and live my life like a Christian.

I think it would be nice to have a space for all beliefs and religions to come together to spend time. A tribute to all faiths of those who were killed as well as their family members. It would bring people together rather than seperate them.

So where can Muslims go that is gonna be OK for all Christian folks?

I mean come on FA why can't this Community Center be built near Ground Zero?

Would it be better had it been a Christian church? Why can't the citizens MUSLIM citizens of New York have a place to go, I am confused can you explain why you think this is not ok?

Thanks in advance

I found this to be Very true, and thought provoking...

:seeingstars:

FA......

It is NOT a Mosque. It is a Community Center that also has a prayer room. It's called the Cordoba House.

How is that inappropriate, considering the number of strip joints and liquor stores that are closer to that 'sacred ground'?

Does that change your opinion?

I did not state that Muslims can't build their community center near Ground Zero. Or that the space would be better if it was a Christian church. I never said it was not ok. In my opinion I stated I felt that space would be *better used as a place for *all faiths and religions* to be able to go to* pay tribute being so close to Ground Zero. And if it was a Christian space available or any other religion I would feel the same way.
I hold nothing personal against Musilims or any other religion Lady Snow. Or do I think any religion is better than any other one.
I hope I clarified my thoughts better this time.

Why though?

Why can't Muslim's have this place to go to? Why can't there be a Community Center built so close?

What is your reasoning?

Truly curious, thanks in advance

I admit that *Inappropriate* is a poor word choice.
I still belive it would be nice to have an all faiths space to go to pay tribute and remember lost loved ones of who were of many different faiths.

Do you feel the Community Center is being built as some kind of tribute ?

I am confused by this as well, thanks in advance

They are building a memorial that will serve this purpose right there ON ground zero. Do you think there needs to be more than one memorial?

Besides what about the atheists that were killed during 9/11?

Continuing to couch 9/11 in religious terms is divisive, not the building of a Islamic Community Center a couple of blocks away. Islam did not fly airplanes into the WTC. A bunch of fundamentalist wahhabist educated terrorists who were all from Saudi Arabia did the deed.

As I stated to Toughy. I chose a poor word choice. I surely am not the only one on this site to do that. I own up to my mistakes. That is the best I can do.
I feel any religion that has access to building a community center and a prayer room so close to Ground Zero would be really compassionate to share that space with other faiths.
Unless a strip joint or liquor store would be willing to sell their business to offer a space nearby as well. Which is not going to happen.

Why is it so scary for Muslims to build a community center? Why is it disrespecful?

Why is it wrong for Muslims to build a community center so close to Ground Zero?

You do realize many Muslims were killed during that attack. I don't understand why it's not ok ?

Who is it going to hurt? scare? Insult?

Every mosque and synagogue has both a "sanctuary" and offices and rooms for meetings and community events. I'd suspect that virtually every church that's been constructed in the past 50 years likely also provides space for church business and members and guests to hold gatherings. That's part of the function of a religious institution -- a place for the community to gather. There is no such thing as a Muslim Community Center that would not offer prayer space.
Twenty percent of American republicans believe that Obama is a closet Muslim and was born in Kenya. Far more Americans believe that the perpetrators of 911 were caught and are all Muslims and nobody else had any involvement whatsoever. Perhaps in the lives of our grandchildren there will be an authentic investigation.
The investigation of 911 was conducted a lot like the Israeli investigation of the murders of 9 civil rights workers on the flotilla from Turkey attempting to deliver humanitarian aid to Gaza. Imagine - Israel investigated itself. (Becha they come up innocent, ech?).
Christians, Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Shihks and atheists were all killed in 911.
Three thousand people died. Look how many people we have massacred in Iraq and Afghanistan since 911. I guess american lives are infinitly more valuable than those of backwards Arabs who don't know enough to appreciate our invastion.
Much of the fucking world should be sacred ground dedicated to the hapless innocent lives lost at the hands of aggressors.
Sad state of affairs that we just never learn from history. We go on repeating the same sickening errors time and time again ad nauseum.
I wonder how one can come to live a sacred life in this world.

FA?
I beg of you to watch this video.
It will show you the area surrounding Ground Zero, exactly where the Islamic Community Center is proposed to be built AND the many many many churches already there.

Does that change your perception a little? Because I feel like your opinion is based on a point that is missing a lot of fact. I hope that the video can fill in those facts for you.

by FA: "...'It would bring people together rather than seperate them'.

who exactly is doing the seperating?? the Muslims?? or the the hating and the fear mongering crowd ?? So much for tolerance and acceptance.
The TRUTH may be a bitter pill for some to swallow, but it's still way better than the alternative.

Wow. I don't even need to finish that article to know that the entire thing is not based on fact, but rather on fear and hatred.

"The proposed mosque near to ground zero is not really a religious institution. It would be — as many mosques throughout the nation are — a terrorist recruitment, indoctrination and training center."

How can you possibly believe that the above quote is true?

"But there are non-Sharia mosques where peaceful and spiritual Muslims worship God in their own way without promoting violence. A soon-to-be published study funded by Frank Gaffney’s Center for Security Policy, found that 20% of the mosques in the United States have no taint of Sharia and simply promote peaceful worship."

This right wing loon appears regularly on Fox News....

1 - Anybody can make a study to prove anything that they want. I'm sure you could also find studies that have the exact opposite results.

2 - Frank Gaffney is not a sane, responsible, or unbiased voice. If you do some research on him you'll find that he's got a very clear hate-on bias against Muslims. It's personal for him. I do not trust anything he says on the subject, or anything said by any organisation that he is a part of. The man has no credibility as far as this issue is concerned.

3 - At least the truth has come out. I'm glad that you have admitted (in a roundabout way) that your true issue is not about "bringing people together v dividing people" and rather about "scary Muslims". Thanks, I always like to know who I'm dealing with.

Frank Gaffney is a batshit paranoid moron who believes that Saddam Hussein was behind 9/11, the '93 attacks on the WTC -and- the Oklahoma City bombing.

linkyloo

Why would anybody take -anything- he says seriously?

I find it gross that you act like you are all about a place where everyone should come and worship, when it's obvious you have bought into the whole scary Muslim people are gathering and building terrorist training camps.

It's just gross.