A recent blog post about the importance of being an involved citizen made me realize that I have been a moral coward and need to stop. I have not blogged about the controversy around the Park 51 Islamic Cultural Center because of two things: a) other people have already expressed my thoughts better than I could and b) I didn’t want to deal with controversial topics on my site.
Really? I was really backing away from lending my vocal support to the folks who want to build this center because I was afraid people would say mean things to me on my blog?
So let me say right now that I support Park51’s vision and mission.
Vision statement
Park51 is a nonsectarian community, cultural and interfaith spiritual center along with a Muslim prayer area and a monument to honor all those we lost on 9/11. Park51 enriches lower Manhattan in body and spirit, with ecologically conscious design and operation. Our goals are pluralism, service, arts and culture, health and healing. A group of downtown Muslim-Americans envisioned a sanctuary where everyone is welcome to learn, experience the arts and culture and explore their relationship to faith. In the near future, Park51 will offer green, world-class recreational and educational facilities, and a friendly and accessible platform for conversations across our identities.
Mission statement
Park51 celebrates arts, culture and ideas, bringing the best of the world to New York City, and New York City’s energy and diversity to the world. Park51 will become a model for future institutions, with its inclusive focus, sustainable design and dedication to social needs.
Park51 strives to:
- Encourage dialogue, harmony and respect amongst all people, regardless of race, faith, gender or cultural background.
- Establish a state-of-the-art eco-friendly facility that will serve as a model and inspiration for sustainable space in an urban context.
- Cultivate neighborly relations amongst New Yorkers, fostering civic participation
- Revive the historic Muslim tradition of education, engagement and service.
- Promote Muslim-Americans identities, engaging New York’s many and diverse Muslim communities.
- Build partnerships and relationships with institutions who share our values
- Provide a wide array of social services for children, women & families, seniors immigrants, small business owners and high-need adult populations
If this were the mosque that it has been inaccurately described as, I would also support building it. To not do so implies that there is something inherently wrong with residents in New York practicing their religion in New York. Or anywhere for that matter.
I’m speaking up now because I feel that my silence is giving an implicit agreement to the people who are opposing the project. Which is just wrong. I’d no more oppose building an Islamic Community Center than I would a Christian one, like the YMCA or a Jewish one or a Pagan one.
So, in no particular order, here are just some reasons that I want to add my voice in support of Park51 community center even though I don’t live in NYC anymore and it’s none of my business.
- Sounds like a good project to me.
- The community it is in approved it.
- First amendment.
- Beats the heck out of a strip club.
Once again you step up and prove you’re awesome.
I would expand just a wee bit on your summary point #2. Among the New York-local folk in favor of Park 51 are His Honor Michael Bloomberg, and Pegasus-winning filker Batya Wittenberg. If you’re not familiar with either of these people, both of them are Jewish; Batya is Orthodox. The way I figure it, if the bloc of New Yorkers in favor of Park 51 include those two learned individuals? That kinda makes all arguments against it seem petty and disingenuous. I would even go so far as to say
2a. 9th and 10th Amendments… i.e. if it’s not explicitly in the Constitution as being something FedGov has a say about, it’s up to New York (state, county, and city) to decide, and, as you said, nobody else’s business.
But I do think it’s right to *express support* for it, simply because so many of the arguments against are bigoted and generally anti-freedom, and that kind of bovine scatology needs cleaning up wherever we find it.
Awesome! Thanks so much for this! I totally and completely agree with you! Thanks a lot!