Posted on 08/23/2010 2:50:34 AM PDT by markomalley
New York City imam Feisal Abdul Rauf claims that the proposed mosque at Ground Zero is an attempt by the Muslim community to “build bridges“.
It is named after Cordoba in southern Spain, a city where between the eighth and 12th centuries, Muslims, Jews and Christians intermingled freely. In fact, during the 10th century under the Moorish caliphate, Cordoba became a major global city and boasted the world’s biggest library.
In 786 the Arab caliph, Abd-er Rahman I, began the construction of the great mosque of Cordova [Cordoba], now the cathedral, and compelled many Christians to take part in the preparation of the site and foundations. Though they suffered many vexations, the Christians continued to enjoy freedom of worship, and this tolerant attitude of the ameers seduced not a few Christians from their original allegiance. Both Christians and Arabs co-operated at this time to make Cordova a flourishing city, the elegant refinement of which was unequalled in Europe. Under Abd-er Rahman II there came a change in the attitude of the Arab rulers, and a fierce persecution ensued, during which many Christians were accused of abusing the memory of Mohammed, of entering mosques, and of conspiracy against the Government.
After a hundred years, as things got worse for Christians, there was disagreement among them about the best way to deal with the situation.
In the person and work of Paulus of Albarus of Cordova, we are thrust into the midst of the troubled conditions of Moorish Spain in the mid-ninth century. Most of the peninsula had been under the yoke of the [Muslims] for more than a hundred years. [...][...] The situation was tragic for the morale of the Christian subjects. Many of them had accepted Islam, some wholeheartedly, others externally only; and some sought relief in conversion to the related Semitic religion, Judaism. But even among those Mozarabs who remained loyal to the church, divergent attitudes appeared: there were those who wanted to accommodate Christianity to the Moorish environment and there were those who believed that such acquiescence to hostile pressure was dishonorable if not tantamount to apostasy.
St. Eulogius penned the Memoriale Sanctorum which is a Christian martyrology providing the accounts of the deaths of the Martyrs of Córdoba.
His extant writings are proof that Alvarus did not exaggerate. They give an account of what is most important from 848 to 859 in Spanish Christianity, both without and within the Mussulman dominions, especially of the lives of the martyrs who suffered during the Saracenic persecution, quorum para ipse magna fuit. He was elected Archbishop of Toledo shortly before he was beheaded (11 March, 859).
Under Muslim rule since the year 711, many Orthodox of Cordoba had settled into an all too ‘comfortable’ relationship with their rulers. Martyrdom was to challenge the conformism and complacency of most of the Christians of Cordoba who, though second-class citizens, lived harmoniously with their Muslim rulers. In reality, they were gradually, almost unnoticeably, being assimilated. Most notably of all, the erastian-minded Bishop of Cordoba, one Reccafredus, placed compromised and co-operation with the Muslim authorities above the Faith. In fact, controversially, and scandalously, he was to side with the Muslims against the martyrs of his own Church that he was supposed to represent. No doubt he feared loss of power and the closure of some of the four basilicas and nine monasteries in and around Cordoba.
History, therefore, bears out the brutal reality that “living in peace” to Islamists means that you can be secure provided that you do things their way. The imam asks us to look to the example of Cordoba and to consider that we can have such a society again with the building of a mosque at Ground Zero. He has saved us much trouble in suggesting that. The history for us is clear and it is a history that no Catholic would like to see a repeat of in Manhattan.
Here are some of the names of the Martyrs of Cordoba and why they died.
St. Perfectus, priest: Promised security if he would reveal his true belief about Islam. Betrayed and murdered after he did just that.
St. Isaac, secretary of the imam, later went to a monastery. Willfully denounced Mohammed. Beheaded and suspended upside down in public.
SS. Peter, Walabonsus, Sabinian, Wistremund, Habentius and Jeremiah — a priest, a deacon and some monks, martyred for saying the following words to the authorities:
We abide by the same confession, O magistrate, that our most holy brothers Isaac and Sanctius professed. Now hand down the sentence, multiply your cruelty, be kindled with complete fury in vengeance for your prophet. We profess Christ to be truly God and your prophet to be a precursor of Antichrist and an author of profane doctrine.
As we Catholics read the Memoriale Sanctorum, we are more apt to question the goals of the Cordoba Initiative. What we see from Cordoba is a people duped by a murderous culture which pretended to be something it is not and ultimately left all non-Muslims under the rule of Sharia Law. If that is what the imam refers to as “living in peace,” we’ll have to pass on that.
God Bless those who protested against the GZ mosque yesterday.
Now I know why the Christians in time went to war to take Spain back.
I learned about the following from the inestimable Father Z. He suggested that a chapel dedicated to the memory of Saints Nunilo and Alodia would be appropriate for Ground Zero, to counteract the proposed mosque. Nunilo and Alodia were sisters, whose father was muslim and mother was Christian. When their father died, their mother remarried (another muslim), and the stepfather persecuted them, imprisoned them, and eventually turned them over during the persecution of Abdur Rahman II, at which point they were beheaded. They are patron saints of child abuse victims, martyrs, people ridiculed for their piety, and single laywomen.
Yup, the article was posted on FR here.
Ss Nunilo and Alodia pray for us
I find it hard to believe that, after 9/11, many New Yorkers can be so ignorant of history that they can read the words “Cordoba Project” and now know, immediately, what is being offered.
The Muslims are proposing that New York City could become the provincial capital of the Global Caliphate, the new Cordoba, and thus have a relatively comforable position in the new, Islamic, North America. In return for bowing deeply and more readily than our less sophisticated countrymen, the promise is that the tyrant’s heel would rest more lightly on our necks and that many of us will be spared the sword, or even prosper.
So, the question is, are my fellow New Yorkers so ignorant that they just don’t get it, or are they so hollow that they want to take this deal?
I fear it is the latter.
Sadly, I think we’ll see the same story of compromise and submission take place among the churches here. In the US, Christian churches have already grown used to harrassment at the hands of secularists. Most of it is petty, such as the removal of those roadside crosses the other day, but it nonetheless indicates that not only Christians but the US population in general regards the Christian church as something that is not to be supported. Islam, on the other hand, is being privileged and it is clear that even if Islam doesn’t have the military power to make itself preeminent, the US government is putting it in that position and Christians are going to become second class citizens.
I am already seeing Christian “leaders” of all different denominations making conciliatory and abysmally stupid statements about Islam, particularly in connection with the 9/11 Victory Mosque, and I think we’re only going to see this increase. For one thing, there are many heresies at work in our Christianity here, just as there were in early Spain. The Visigoths had been Arians, and even though by that time they had converted to Catholicism, their doctrine had infected the Church in certain parts of Spain and had resulted in the production of other similar heresies and heretical tendencies that essentially denied the divinity of Christ and other provisions of the Creed.
Look at AmChurch here and you have an idea of some of the future leading dhimmi lights. Look at all the Protestant churches that don’t seem to believe anything at all and you’ll see more of them. Look at the “pragmatic” Orthodox, used for centuries to accomodating themselves to Islam in their home countries. Martyrs will still arise, and the Church will still triumph and come through it stronger, but it’s not going to be easy.
It’s difficult to tell from this vantage point whether they will consume the captive earth men or merely enslave them. One thing is for certain, there is no stopping them; the ants will soon be here. And I, for one, welcome our new insect overlords. I’d like to remind them that as a trusted TV personality, I can be helpful in rounding up others to…toil in their underground sugar caves.”
That's essentially what it is. The "Cordoba House" is also supposed to be the home of something called the "Sharia Index," which measures how closely countries comply with sharia (the Muslim legal and economic system). So I guess by accepting the mosque, New York will get in on the ground floor in enforcing sharia compliance and all will be well for it.
In all fairness, it's not only New Yorkers who are supporting this. Idiots all over the country, from DC on out, are emerging to support the Victory Mosque.
Interesting point to note:
Liberals are identical to muslims......cooperation, outreach and peace are all predicated on accepting THEIR views of the world-—no other.
I’m not a religious man, so I say the following as a lover of freedom rather than a follower of another religion:
Every day I become more convinced that we will need to cleanse Western culture of this scurge called Islam. They are ruthless liars, unashamed hypocrites, unrepentent persecuters of anyone whose beliefs differ (including other Muslims), and violent barbarians.
When it happens (not if), it will be entirely caused by the actions of followers of Islam. And just like a petulant child, they will blame others and claim it’s not fair. Surely, it will be considered another Crusade when in fact it will be a defense of freedom from barbarians.
I don’t want to hear from or about moderates. Even the moderates belief utter tripe about Islam’s place in the world and those evil Jooooooos.
Ping to more info about the Ground Zero project name.
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