From CP, with thanks to Susan:
The Calgary Health Region has placed doors in front of a stained glass portrait of St. Luke, the Beloved Physician, at the Foothills Hospital chapel so that it is no longer visible.A note posted on the doors explains the decision was made because the chapel is a multifaith sanctuary, and that any representation of the human form inside a place of worship is offensive to Muslims and Jews. But the decision is inane, according to Calgary's Roman Catholic Bishop Fred Henry, who said covering the saint is going too far.
Quite so.
I was under the impression that muslims were tolerant of other faiths. At least that's what they tell me. But 'they' say a lot of things.
Has anyone ever heard of any Jews who complained about the display of Christian images in Europe, the US or Canada?
Philip: My words! When did a Jew ever complain????
Yeah. They're making out that Jews are offended by this, when there would no doubt be, not one peep from Jews at all.
How dare they lie about Jews like this?
"A note posted on the doors explains the decision was made because the chapel is a multifaith sanctuary, and that any representation of the human form inside a place of worship is offensive to Muslims and Jews."
Wait a minute.
Does this mean that a Muslim is kneeling down and worshipping Mohammed in THAT Chapel?
Isn't this chapel sanctified in the name of St.Luke?
Voltaire: because they haven't got the guts to say that they are only really concerned about placating Muslims.
Utterly deplorable and spineless behavior. I am afraid we as a civilization are indeed lost.
Nothing can stop the death dive of the west except it near total destruction. Perhaps then, once it is faced with the prospect of either:
1) Conversion to Islam
2) Pay the Jizya tax
3) Sword
Will it finally realize what it has done and have some small chance of recovering, though history's graveyard is full of civilizations that tried valiently to prevent their own inevitable death.
The idea of an ummah, a higher level of community (enabled by multiculturalism) may very well render the old notions of nationhood extinct in the new Islamic millenium dawning.
The world has gone bloody mad and its gonna get a whole lot worse before it gets better.
Wherefore inane? It is a multifaith chapel. People of all religions go there to pray for the well-being and grieve for the loss of relatives and loved ones. Why should they be excluded from doing this by displays which make it a place they cannot use for that purpose? Assumedly, in Canada, the state even pays for the upkeep of this chapel. That means Muslims and Jews are paying for a chapel they cannot use in their time of greatest need. Wouldn't some Christians complain if there were verses from the Koran inscribed on the dooor?
And, yes, believe it or not, Jews do complain about such things. They may be less likely to do so than Muslims only because of long memory of the results of asking that their rights be respected--namely persecution. Muslims, as we all know, are a bit more "muscular" in their response to percieved persecution.
Hugh Bristic
The hospital is called St. Luke. Doesn't sound like a hindu hospital to me. it sounds like a Catholic Hospital.
If the traditional identity of St. Luke's Hospital is Christian in nature, their interfaith chapel is a privildge, not a right for other faiths to use. Furtermore, if covering up all aspects of our traditional Judeo-Christian Ciivilization is done so under the guise of multi-faith, multicultural, who should we continue to keep allowing foreigners in countries where their prescence is leading to the erasure of our identity.
About the your "Jews complain comment", I don't find that any of my many Jewish friend ever cared about such issues as banning all expressions of Christanity, totally segrating Christmas from public and destroying our traditions.
However leftism and liberalism have enabled this destruction to occur and in the end, only a fool would think tearing the dominant culture down will not result in some more motivated group assuming a position of power from it.
If you don't like the stained glass, then you don't like the name and have to change it from St. Lukes to....Lukes, no that too biblical, how about "Opportunity" or "Diversity" hospital? Thats pretty non descript and in line with the false tenents of multiculturism.
"A note posted on the doors explains the decision was made because the chapel is a multifaith sanctuary, and that any representation of the human form inside a place of worship is offensive to Muslims and Jews."
Great!!! So when do all the mosques in the west and the middle-east get to become multifaith sanctuaries for christians and jews? When do we get to see this happen to prove to everyone the mega-ultra super tolerance of muslims? Maybe then on Sundays we can blast out evangelical born-again rock music from the minarettes five times a day. I am sure the muslim reaction/commotion at the "sanctuary" gates below would look like one frenzied moshpit with cars filled with fireworks going off all over the place.
Hugh Bristic (Hubris)
Sorry for the many typos, I type badly to begin with and when I am angry and in a rush, I go spastic (no offence to any spastic people out there). Not to mention some keys that stick or not depending on how they feel.
sheese.
Andrew,
Don't worry about the typos. Happens to everyone. :-)
I think folks are projecting their anger about other things onto this situation. Nowhere in the article does it even say that the hospital received complaints from anyone. Perhaps it was just a gesture of Christian understanding and charity. They may have come to the conclusion on reflection that such displays are unnecessary for Christian religious practice and may keep others from worshiping in the manner their faith requires. I don't think anyone is trying to "ban all expressions of Christianity" in Canada (now Saudi Arabia is another matter).
Also, I don't know how Canadians conceive of themselves, but my identity as an American is unrelated to being a Christian. Being an American has to do with respecting the rights of others, rule of law, representative democracy, etc. As long as people agree to those ground rules, I don't care if we are overwhelmed with a horde of non-Christian immigrants.
Within the last few months, British schools were renamed to remove the offensive term "Saint." Now in Canada, the religion of the majority population has to step aside, removing names and symbols so as not to offend a small minority of its population.
In the name of tolerance and multiculturalism we are giving up our own heritage for the one that will not only swallow us whole, but treat us with disdain as dhimmis!
This practice is insane!
I don't think of this as dhimmitude - instead I consider it "stupiditude". This is PC running amok.
Variation on this insidious theme:
I recently paid a visit to the headquarters of American Airlines in Dallas. One of my hosts took me aside down a side hallway to show me something on the hush-hush. They led me to a locked door with a small nondescript sign affixed that reads, "Prayer Room".
My host explained that the Muslim employees complained about non-accomodation of their needs so the company yielded to their veiled threats of civil suit for "racism" (and all the usual equally baseless accusations that they routinely level at private and public American institutions). So what they have done is accede to the establishment of a de facto mosque within the very heart of the carrier's headquarters building!
Aside from the rage that I harbour because of American Airline's spineless management's inability to just say no, there is a greater concern. If I recall correctly, two of the hijacked airplanes on 9/11 were American Airlines, right? So where did the hijackers get all the inside dope on the airline's security and flight crew hijack emergency procedures? From the inside do ya think? If the Muslims have enough presence and enough clout to beat the management into submission on the on-premises mosque, they must have enough people in all departments of the carrier to obtain whatever top secret information they need to facilitate any jihadi operation in the future.
The fox is not only in the henhouse, he is running the place. How much you wanna bet this is the case at all the major carriers?
I was actually going to send this in to RS, but someone beat me to it. However, I am a Calgarian, and on the CTV local site, I found this: http://www.cfcn.ca/servlet/RTGAMArticleHTMLTemplate/B/20041213/Religion?brand=generic&hub=&tf=CFCNPlus/generic/hubs/frontpage.html&cf=CFCNPlus/generic/hubs/frontpage.cfg&slug=Religion&date=20041213&archive=CFCNPlus&ad_page_name=&nav=home&subnav=fullstory
Sorry! It is long, and I don't know how to put into those brackets.
Anyway, this is the story.
~~CHR says covering Christian symbol not discrimination
POSTED AT 4:01 PM Monday, December 13
The Calgary Health Region says covering a Christian stained glass windows in the Foothills Hospital chapel is not discrimination.
The CHR says it is just a way to provide an all inclusive inter-denominational space for people of all faiths.
A sign outside the Foothills Hospital chapel says all are welcome.
Inside the chapel, a stained glass representation of Saint Luke, the beloved physician, is veiled by shutters that can be opened or closed.
Christians wishing to see the window can open the shutters.
The Calgary Health Region says the shutters were added so people of the Jewish and Muslim faith would not feel uncomfortable using the room.
Gordon Jackson is the Foothills Hospital Chapel Coordinator. "A representation of the human form in a sacred space is unacceptable to these two faith groups so this gives us much more of an option in terms of how we use this chapel."
The CHR says adding shutters to the stain glass window wasn't the result of a complaint.
There is only one other hospital chapel in the region with stained glass windows.
The chapel in the Peter Lougheed has stained glass windows that used to be in the chapel at the old General Hospital.~~
There is now a picture and news interview on this, and today's poll is on this issue. Like the guy above said, Jews and Muslims don't go to chapels, the very word chapel means Christian church. And there's a chapel in every hospital, and every seniors home. 2 years ago, the word "Christmas" was banned from institutions and Christmas cards. Now they are 'seasonal' holidays, the 12 days of Giving, and just plain 'Winter festivities'. Everyone still thinks this about Jews, no one knows that it is really toadying to Islam.
Hugh Bristic
Your identity as an American is related to many things and the things that make you American are under relentless assault. You may disregard all the signs around you, but there are those more than happy to define what it means to be an "American" in the absence of any will to defend it.
The Foothills Hospital Chapel is not used by Jews . The four Jewish congregations in Calgary have their own resources.The Calgary Health Region is off topic. The problem is 6-12 month waiting lists for joint replacemant, 3 months for MRI etc....not St. Luke.
By the way, the Calgary Muslim Council raised $145,000 for the Canadian metastases of CAIR last year[Caircan]
We cannot blame the Jews. Our left-wing-pro-islamic bias media always point their fingers at the Jews. I worked for a Jew. I remember I got a Christmas present from him. He also sent Christmas greeting cards and gifts to his valued clients.It is obvious that he enjoyed the Christmas tradition. At the same time he was celebrating Hunnukka(if that's the correct spelling). Jewish people are very tolerant of Christians and their traditions. There is one special interest group that finds Christmas very offensive. They are the muslims. They are the buggers to blame when it comesto banning Christian cultures and holidays.
Why should the “St.” in “St. Luke’s Hospital be retained at all? While a complete break with the past is unadvisable, surely that little honorific – besides, who made him a saint in the days before there was a procedure for vetting put into palce? – can go. Call it, instead, the “Lucky Luke” Hospital. Everyone could use a bit of luck during a hospital visit or stay, and didn’t that Belgian comic-strip cowboy sometimes fall off his horse, or gotten sick once in a while?
Or if you don’t like that, then what about “Cool Hand Luke” Hospital. It combines two themes – the “Healing Hand” (incidentally, the very title of a book on the history of medicine by the late Guido Majno) of the physician, who if a surgeon needs a “cool” or “steady” hand, and of course incorporates by reference that famous statement that the world surely needs, more than ever, if it is truly to become that Family of Man of which Edward Steichen somewhat prematurely did the photo album, and to which Rodney King looked forward so hopefully (“Why can’t we all get along?”), for in our hearts we know that everyone wants the same thing, we are all striving toward the same goal, and if at times we seem mired in miscommunication, misunderstanding, sheer hysterical islamophobia, it is only because we self-satisfied ex-colonial but still post-colonial discoursers have a vested interest in Creating the Other, that Other without whom we apparently cannot possibly exist, and whom we endow with all sorts of wicked beliefs that are so very far from the truth, and what better way to show our revised good intentions than to rename a hospital that will allude, however delicately, to that famous phrase that defines our whole problem: “What we have here is a failure to communicate.”
Failure to communicate, indeed.
OT:
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Susanb
They have one of these "interfaith prayer rooms" in the new Detroit Metro Airport. Out of curiosity, I went to look at it. It was hard to find, I had to wend my way through several long non-descript dingy corridors in the bowels of the airport to get at it. I opened the door, and found myself in a mosque, for all intents and purposes. There were the prayer rugs all over, the little signs pointing to mecca, some chairs scattered about, low-lighting, and that's it. So: all the fixtures of the mohammedans, nothing of Christianity. Let me tell you, as a Christian, it in no way put me in the disposition to pray.
Ages ago, I saw at Don Muang Airport in Bangkok a section with mats and qiblah to accommodate Muslim prayer. It was a sop to a minority and regional allies (Malaysia, Indonesia, and Brunei) by the Buddhist Kingdom.
Can you now see why France put an end to Muslims promoting their religion by making girls wear the Hijab in public schools.
Once the Hijab was a fixture in the schools the next step would be to ban other faiths that offend Muslim dress codes,then all girls will be forced to wear hijabs as to not offend islamic dress codes.
I always amazed when Muslim leaders drag in Jews and Christians to their cause when they demand changes to un-Islamic parts of Canadian society. The Toronto transit Commission is under pressure to change the name of stops that have Christian roots because they offend Muslims.
Wake-up folks
Muslim tolerance?