St. Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church stood in the shadow of the World Trade Center and was crushed under the rubble when the towers collapsed on September 11, 2001. Almost nine years later it has still not been rebuilt; the rebuilding project is mired in bureaucracy, with New York City officials being uncooperative and throwing up roadblock after roadblock.
The contrast is telling with the mad rush on the part of New York City officials to build the Islamic supremacist mega-mosque at Ground Zero, sweeping aside calls to landmark the Burlington Coat Factory building, into which crashed the landing gear from one of the 9/11 planes, as a war memorial -- despite the fact that buildings of far lesser historical significance have been designated as landmarks in New York.
From a March 2009 New York Times story on the church (where, incidentally, my mother was baptized):
Last July, the Port Authority and the Greek Orthodox Church announced a tentative plan to rebuild the church just east of its original site, at Liberty and Greenwich Streets. The authority agreed to provide the church with land for a 24,000-square-foot house of worship, far larger than the original, and $20 million. Since the church would be built in a park over the bomb-screening center, the authority also agreed to pay up to $40 million for a blast-proof platform and foundation.In recent negotiations, the authority cut the size of the church slightly and told church officials that its dome could not rise higher than the trade center memorial.
But a thirteen-story mega-mosque? Fine!
Unable to rebuild their church, the St. Nicholas congregation has held St. Nicholas Day services in a tent at Ground Zero:
But a thirteen-story Islamic supremacist mega-mosque headed by a pro-Sharia, anti-free speech imam who refuses to denounce Hamas and has a history of duplicitous statements? Let's clear aside every hurdle, tar opponents as bigots, and get that baby built!
Hypocrisy revealed; a telling contradiction.
I keep saying this because it is a fact...This mosque is a giant phallic symbol...A symbol of victory by rape...Since the actual mosque will be on the top floor, Mahoundians will be able to 'look down on' the carnage of Allah...Those below will get to 'look up' at the symbol of the rapist...
Rapists should be in prison, not out building giant ziggurats (shades of Nimrod) phallic symbols as monuments to themselves, and their fake god...
Every American should be outraged...
The pictures say it all: that amazing shot of the little church and the twin towers, and then the 'after' shot, of the tent.
There is, of course, too, the other very famous picture of St Nicholas's that I've linked more than once lately, in threads about the 9/11 mosque.
It's the dramatic, heartbreaking shot, in stark black and white, that one Eric O'Connell took only minutes before the towers came thundering down.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/03/nyregion/03trade.html?_r=1&n=Top/Reference/Times%20Topics/People/B/Bagli,%20Charles%20V
(Look on the left side of the page; you can enlarge the image).
I can never look at it without wanting to cry.
By the way: St Nicholas's Day is 6 December.
I think every New York City jihadwatcher who can manage it, and out-of-towner jihadwatchers likewise, should plan to be right there in that tent on 6 December this year for the St Nicholas's Day services, to swell the congregation - and fill the collection plate to help the budget for the rebuild. Come on everyone, surprise them! Let them find that their little tent is surrounded by hundreds or even by thousands of people.
Cordoba House co-religionists must return Muslim-occupied Cyprus and the Hostage Ghost City of Famagusta (home of the desecrated St. Nicholas Cathedral)— then victimhood cultists of Cordoba House can howl about their alleged “right” to build on Ground Zero.
St. Nicholas called— he’d like his cathedral back.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St_Nicholas_Cathedral_Of_Cyprus
VIDEO: Famagusta, The Hostage Ghost City of Europe @
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xcfBJ7DimB8
I am ENRAGED to the point of tears! I didn't know about St. Nicolas Orthodox Church. I am with dumbledoresarmy!
"I think every New York City jihadwatcher who can manage it, and out-of-towner jihadwatchers likewise, should plan to be right there in that tent on 6 December this year for the St Nicholas's Day services, to swell the congregation - and fill the collection plate to help the budget for the rebuild. Come on everyone, surprise them! Let them find that their little tent is surrounded by hundreds or even by thousands of people."
I know that the city/port authority has now taken the Church's land by the order of emminent domain and HAS NOT compensated them for the land AT ALL.
I just wish that the Greek Archdiocese in New York City COULD DO SOMETHING ABOUT THIS!!!
Here is the website for the Church.
A person can donate there as well.
http://www.stnicholasnyc.com/
Maybe these Islamic supremacists are making sure no other church or temple is built near ground zero. I wonder how many Islamic dollars are making sure this church never get rebuilt.
Allah knows best. Prophet Muhammad, with this Madison Avenue tagline, not unlike "Trust your car to the man who wears the Star", was the consummate carnival tent barker, inviting the rubes to see for themselves the wonders and delights that lay just beyond the flaps. For a relatively minuscule fee, a virtual paradise awaits you. In a PC world, today's champions of the faith have left behind their tents and build grotesque edifices, and those that remain are lucky to be housed in windswept hovels. God Bless America.
DDA provides a link to a detail I'd not previously read. From her link here is the caption from under the referenced photo:
I highlighted the detail about the Port Authority to draw attention to a
Then consider this post at Atlas Shrugs
So, we have here collusion with ME financial interests with ties to the Bin Laden group, taking control of both the rebuilding of the trade center and the so called 'Cordoba Initiative'.
How difficult is it to build or repair a church in Muslim majority nations? Answer: Very. Yet Bloomberg and company would have concerned citizens believe ME financial interests potentially controlling these sites is of no concern. After connecting these dots, is it any wonder why the St. Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church continues to sit in bureaucratic limbo (sharia influence?)?
The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey will soon decide which partner will manage and help market the tower, which has been renamed One World Trade Center. The partner will invest at least $100 million into the office tower and memorial building.
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No matter who lands the deal, CAIR will SUGGEST a copy of the Holy Qur'an be included in the building's time capsule. Multicultural inclusiveness should be served.
THis needs a big publicity campaign in Ny itself! There is no way that the typical New Yorker is going to keep quiet about this if the right information is put in front of them... Any NY talk show hosts have connections to this church or this sect?
Here's a picture of the lovely little St. Nicholas Church, from the late 1920s or early 1930s:
http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2008/07/24/nyregion/24church.190.jpg
Had the tiny church survived, it would soon have been celebrating its hundredth birthday.
Robert:
I am astounded. I have become used to finding stories that should have been common knowledge long ago, but this is beyond the pale.
I am outraged, especially at the descriptions of the NYC government double standards.
I am saddened at the loss to your family and all other families who held some memory of this church, even if long past.
Thank you for this post. I think I will have a glum and reflective evening.
There is a disgusting set of double-standards in operation here, played-out in duplicity, blindness, egoism, and cupidity.
Maybe in the 'let's do a musical' tradition, an outdoor performance of Benjamin Britten's 'St Nicholas Cantata' could be organised for the site, as a fundraiser for the church...
In honour of St Nicholas.
A stunning performance of the 3rd part of that cantata, from France:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VOV2VxQDPzI&feature=related
Imagine singing *that* next to Ground Zero.
One gets what one deserve.It was you who elected HUSAIN OBAMA.This kind of story is the norm in Islamic countries but to read it about NYC is just outrgeous.May god helps us all
Here are some photos of the St Nicolas Church as it appeared on 9/11, I can't remember where I downloaded these from:
http://s528.photobucket.com/albums/dd329/agent8698/Crescent%20of%20Embrace/?action=view¤t=01-Roll_3_1225.jpg
Thankfully, the story about the Church is starting to get mainstream attention. A congressional candidate in NY was on Fox News recently.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U7Q_Ai_c7eY
This isn't about the terrorists who attacked us on 9/11 and who we are battling around the globe. It's about hate for a people and a culture. Sadly, it's about the election too, as it is a good way for conservative leaders to rally their troops. I read these comments and I think of Germany in the 1930s or the very militant fundamentalist you (and I) deplore. This isn't Europe. We don't have a Muslim problem here. Some people would like to create one, I guess, and maybe this is a good way to arouse Muslim resentment. Congratulations, when you divide us, you are doing bin Laden's job. The arguments I've been reading here and elsewhere are just sad. No one wants to talk about the first amendment - they say it either doesn't apply, or it's a one time thing, or, the state should intercede (and somehow that doesn't trigger the first amendment), or they fantasize about a Muslim plot and so on. I bet many of you laugh when you hear a crazy rumor people in the middle east believe about us or Israelis, but it seems that when it comes to this topic, we are just as gullible.
'David'
'Hate for a people and a culture".
What 'people'?
Muslims are of multiple ethnicities.
You aren't *born* Muslim (though, nonsensically, Muslims believe that all babies are *really* born Muslim and only become something else because their wicked, wicked parents indoctrinate them with other faiths - this is a convenient belief to hold, if you spend a lot of time kidnapping and brainwashing of other people's children, like Muslims have done all through their history, because you can pretend to yourself that you're only helping the poor children to grow up Muslim like they're supposed to do); nothing in a person's dna decrees that a person will observe all the rules of Islamic sharia, pray Muslim prayers five times a day, etc.
But if by 'people' you mean the 'Ummah', or Mohammedan mob, well, guess what? - *they're* taught to hate YOU if you're not a Muslim; to hate you *because* you're not a Muslim.
From the Sira, or canonical Life of Mohammed, attributed to Ibn Ishaq:
Ishaq, 231 - “Muslims are one ummah (community) to the exclusion of all men. Believers are friends of one another to the exclusion of all outsiders.”
As for the 'culture'....
I hate the 'culture' of Kim Jung Il's North Korea. The 'culture' of Mao's China in the deepest, darkest days of the Cultural Revolution was eminently worthy of any sane person's hatred; as was the 'culture' of Hitler's Nazi Germany.
And I think the 'culture' of any sharia state is to be deplored and condemned, as deforming and degrading the human beings it holds in thrall.
If you mean by 'culture' the way of life of any society that is zealously striving to conform itself to all the norms of Islamic sharia then yes, I hate - I reject, I criticise, I condemn as antihuman, inhuman, anti-art, anti-music, anti-woman, totalitarian and violent - the 'culture' of Islam.
I hate it *because* of what it does to the human beings it enslaves; for it eats their souls, it damages their capacity for empathy and their capacity for independent and creative thought; it makes them more suspicious, aggressive and murderous, both toward each other and toward outsiders, than they would otherwise be.
I do not feel any obligation to respect a 'religion' that tells its male adherents they can beat - thrash - women whom they merely 'fear' might be rebellious; that tells its male adherents they can wed, and bed, little girls of eight or nine or ten, and use them sexually before the poor little things have even gotten their periods; that tells its male adherents that it's OK to kidnap and keep as a sex slave/ concubine the wife of a non-Muslim man.
http://pajamasmedia.com/phyllischesler/2009/08/26/are-you-an-islamophobe/
PHYLLIS CHESLER: CHESLER CHRONICLES
August 26th, 2009 10:17 am
Are You An Islamophobe?
Take This Test To Be Sure
(from the intro: 'try to raise the issue of Islam’s long history of colonialism, genocide, and gender and religious apartheid and you will quickly be demonized as a “racist” or as an “Islamophobe.”' )
'Lorna Saltzman, a really good writer, an environmentalist, and once a Green Party Presidential candidate, has written a Test Guide for all those who are genuinely worried about their own racism or Islamophobia.
'She writes:
'Are you an Islamophobe? Here is a simple test. Lorna Saltzman’s Test
Do you favor equal rights and treatment of women and men?
Do you oppose stoning of women accused of adultery?
Do you favor mandatory education of girls everywhere?
Do you oppose slavery and child prostitution?
Do you support complete freedom of expression and the press?
Do you support the right of an individual to worship in her chosen religion?
Do you oppose government- and mosque-supported anti-Semitic publications, radio, TV and textbooks?
Do you oppose the wearing of burqas in public places, schools and courts?
Do you oppose segregation of the sexes in public places and houses of worship?
Do you oppose the death penalty for non-Muslims and Muslims who convert to another religion?
Do you oppose “honor” killings?
Do you oppose female genital mutilation?
Do you oppose forced sexual relations?
Do you oppose discrimination against homosexuals?
Do you support the right to criticize religion?
Do you oppose polygamy?
Do you oppose child marriage, forced or otherwise?
Do you oppose the quranic mandate to kill non-Muslims and apostates?
Do you oppose the addition of sharia courts to your country’s legal system?
Do you disagree with the quran which asserts the superiority of Islam to all other religions?
If you answered most or all of these affirmatively, you are a vile Islamophobe and deserve to be beheaded as the quran instructs.
If you answered one third or more of them affirmatively, you are a borderline Islamophobe and need to receive brainwashing to become a full-fledged dhimmi.
If you answered a quarter or fewer affirmatively, you need a few private lessons in dhimmitude to scrub yourself clean of those remnants of Islamophobia.
If you answered affirmatively to NONE of these, Congratulations! You are a worthy observant (radical–PC addition) Muslim and have a bright future vilifying Jews, torturing women or, inshallah, becoming a suicide bomber.”
Thank you Lorna for laying it all out.'
Come on 'David', I dare you: take the test!
And for more on 'Islamophobia', and what it is and what it isn't, here is Hugh Fitzgerald's classic essay - 'Islamophobia? Really?'
http://www.jihadwatch.org/2005/12/fitzgerald-islamophobia-really.html
I advise 'David', above, should he come back to this long-buried thread which I just happened to revisit, to click, and read, and think.
As also any other person, wandering the labyrinths of the internet, who stumbles across this thread and may have been momentarily confused by the accusations 'David' is making against the regular posters at this site (btw, I am not an American, I am an Australian and have no American political axe to grind).