The Debate Continues

It’s a shame that the debate over the mosque at Ground Zero continues.  And it’s a shame to see so much blatant effort to rally support for it despite an overwhelming rejection of the idea from Americans.  Scanning headlines, it’s difficult to find articles that are willing to address how Americans feel (here’s one on how New Yorkers feel).  But given the number of headlines dedicated to touting whatreligious leaders support it, or why Christians ought to support it, it seems clear that the understanding is that the ‘average’ American doesn’t support it.

Not surprisingly, Muslims across the world don’t understand the uproar, and are offended.  I find it interesting that much of the debate has shifted to the definition of the word mosque.  Note how the aforementioned article carefully avoids using the word mosque.  Instead, it refers to the proposed building as “a sort of Muslim YMCA with a pool and a prayer room“.  Fascinating.  There’s a word that Muslims use all the time to describe their prayer rooms.  Know what that word is?

Mosque .

I find it fascinating that the argument is being made that we should not object to this building project because it would represent religious bias, and yet every effort is being made to distance the appropriate and accurate terminology from the discussion.  

If it’s not a place of worship, is it then a persecution of a specific religion?  If it’s a place of worship, then why not use the appropriate terminology?  

Would we even give it a second thought if someone wanted to erect a Timothy McVeigh memorial on the grounds of the former Alfred P. Murrah Building in Oklahoma City?  Would it be even necessary to have this conversation?  The idea would be crushed overwhelmingly.  On what grounds?  On it being illegal to build such a thing?  Of course not.  It would be perfectly legal to do so.  So on what grounds would it be quashed?  On the grounds that it is in monumentally poor taste.  That it is an affront and an insult to those that lost their lives in that attack.  On the grounds that the place to mount a defense is not in the same place where the offense was committed.  

The same is true of a mosque at Ground Zero.  It’s not about whether it’s legal or not.  It’s about whether it’s appropriate.  Why would we hold ourselves to a different standard of appropriateness than some would like us to hold (or not hold) others to?