mosque
Suppose there were a heavily Muslim neighborhood in New York, with mosques, religious schools and shops with meat prepared according to Islamic dietary rules. Suppose an evangelical church wanted to build a chapel there. And suppose local Muslims tried to block it as a flagrant insult to them.
Would Sarah Palin urge the church to retract this “unnecessary provocation” in the “interest of healing”? Would her followers? Or would they scorn this disparagement of Christianity and champion the religious freedom on which America was built?
You know the answer. But Palin is not a slave to intellectual consistency. Change the church to a mosque, and put it a couple of blocks from the site of the World Trade Center, and she suddenly loses all patience with the rights of religious believers.
This week, she posted Twitter comments urging Muslims and New Yorkers to put a stop to a proposed Islamic community center near ground zero because the pain from the 9/11 attacks “is too raw, too real.” The people who live in the vicinity don’t seem to agree. The local community board voted 29-1 to approve the project, which would include a swimming pool, gym, child-care center, performing arts space and other facilities open to the public.
No one objects to putting up other new buildings in the neighborhood. Nor is anyone trying to close down businesses that seem slightly incompatible with the horror that happened there — including a strip club and an off-track betting parlor. The only objection to the Islamic center is that it is Islamic.
source:chicagotribune.com
