Mosque Building and Quran Burning: Just Because You Can Doesn’t Mean You Should

By Alex Milano

Recently, in the midst of the nine-year anniversary of the September 11^th attacks, two controversies arose from opposite sides of the religious spectrum.

The first originated in New York City, where plans to build a mosque near Ground Zero have ignited a fire of criticisms and emotions. The Imam pushing for the center, Feisal Abdul Rauf, has claimed that this will build bridges and hopefully unite the community. The second incident has sparked just as much debate. Terry Jones, a pastor at a 50-member church in Gainesville, Florida gained worldwide notoriety
when he announced that he was going to burn Qurans on September 11^th and declared the day “International Burn a Quran Day”.

Both men are from opposing sides and offer examples of the danger extreme religious views create: that just because you can, doesn’t mean you should.

There is nothing wrong with Feisal Abdul Rauf building a mosque in New York City. As per the First Amendment, he has every right to. However, there is something wrong with building it two blocks away from Ground Zero.

Ground Zero is considered by many to be hallowed ground. It is representative of the thousands of innocent Americans who perished in the 9/11 attacks. Needless to say, it conjures up much of the still-raw emotions the nation felt that day. This is something that the Imam needs to take into consideration. By building a mosque in the proposed location, he will come off as ignorant of Ground Zero’s symbolic presence and ultimately insensitive. The building of a mosque at Ground Zero will hinder what he is supposedly trying to do: better the relationship between Americans and Muslims. This isn’t about discrimination. The controversy surrounding this issue isn’t playing on horribly incorrect stereotypes that paint all Muslims as extremists. It isn’t a Muslims vs. Americans fight. It’s about having the decency to respect the memory of innocent Americans who were murdered that day.

This considered, Rauf’s intentions appear questionable; with alleged ties to Al-Qaeda and certain radical comments which range from essentially threatening Americans in a CNN interview, where he speculated that Americans might find themselves under attack unless the proposed mosque is built to accusing the U.S. of being worse than Al-Qaeda. “We tend to forget, in the West, that the United States has more Muslim blood on its hands than al Qaeda has on its hands of innocent non-Muslims,” Rauf said in 2005. If the Imam truly wants Americans and Muslims to “break bread” together, then he will not build the mosque at the Ground Zero location. What the Imam fails to acknowledge is that his actions are detrimental to the Muslim-America relationship that he (supposedly) is attempting to strengthen. It will harbor anti-Muslim sentiment and needlessly aggravate an already tense situation.

By declaring September 11^th “International Burn a Quran Day”, Terry Jones’ actions proved to be just as ridiculous as those of the Imam’s. His Quran burning falls into the same provocative category as the Imam’s Ground Zero Mosque. Jones clearly wanted to make statement through purely inflammatory actions. The purpose of his desired burnings was to simply stir-up trouble all while failing to consider the consequential violence the troops overseas would certainly  face. When the proposed Quran burning was brought to the attention of General Petraeus, the commander of international forces in Afghanistan he urged Jones to cancel the event. Petraeus believed that should Jones go through with it, U.S. troops would be endangered by the reaction that was sure to follow. Jones, stubbornly and stupidly, did not back down. Finally, after much indecisiveness, the Quran burning was called off for the final time.

The problem lies in the cancellations, postponements, and vows to go through with the burning. Jones was willing to knowingly endanger U.S. troops in order to make a statement through extremist methods. As an American citizen, this is inexcusable. Just as in the case of Rauf, Jones was well within his First Amendment rights. However, anyone with an ounce of decency would have immediately cancelled the burning out of respect and concern for U.S. soldiers. In what Jones claimed as an effort “to expose that there is an element of Islam that is very dangerous and very radical,” he ignored the fact that he has presented the “certain element” of Christianity that is just as dangerous and radical.

Although the Imam and pastor are from opposite sides of the religious spectrum, they both have demonstrated the significant danger that extremism, in any religion, poses: just because you can doesn’t mean you should.