More Thoughts On The Mosque Issue

The Ground Zero mosque controversy has gotten much more heated in the weeks since I made the original post. I also sent the same blog into my county's local paper as a letter to the editor and it was printed yesterday. I think it's important for me to weigh in on this issue again because I feel we, as a country, are making a huge mistake in our reaction to this.

Let me say a few thoughts I have had since the post.

I will admit, building the mosque at its present location is huge public relations blunder for its supporters. That is to say, if their goal is to foster peace and understanding of Islam, they are doing a very poor job. Be that as it may, that's a political issue on their end, not a legal one.

If proof comes out that the backers of the mosque have ties to radicalism I will do a 180 on my position. Public safety trumps 1st amendment.

I have heard the Imam has said he wants Sharia law to be recognized in America. That will never happen. How do I know? Because of the Establishment Clause. Any pundit who makes that argument is just trying to scare the public. Puls, after doing a simple wikipedia search, I learned that there are very different interpretations of Sharia law within Islam. That means any Muslim that says something affrming Sharia is not necessarily talking about the brutal treatment of women.

What bothers me the most about this issue is how willing the American public is to paint mainstream Islam and radical Islam with the same brush. I don't think we realize how dangerous this is. The best way we can make a dent in curving the interest in radical Islam across the world is to let mainstream Islam help. Every time we speak out against the mosque, we are comparing the Muslims who destroyed the World Trade Center to the Muslims who want to build the mosque.

Imagine if Eric Rudolph, a Christian terrorist whose goal was to overthrow the government because of the abortion issue, had killed 200 instead of 2 people at the Olympic Park bombing of '96. If a Baptist church wanted to build 2 blocks away, nobody would care. Why? Because we understand the difference between radical Christianity and mainstream Christianity. We know Christianity didn't attack us; a radical nutjob claiming to be a Christian did.

Complaining that we aren't allowed to build churches in Saudi Arabia and other Muslim countries is a ridiculous argument. They don't allow churches because they don't have freedom of religion. We do.

I wish we would care more about the 1st Amendment than we do about our feelings and emotions.