Parker Jeremiad

If there was one thing in society today that I believe needs lamenting, it would be the fact that, as people of America, we're not necessarily as accepting towards other religions as we should be.

One example would be of something that I recently had happen to me. The other day, I was talking with an old family friend and he said to me, "People who aren't from this country need to go back where they came from and take their beliefs with them." At first, I wanted to punch him in the face, but then I tried to explain to him that the United States stands for freedom to believe in what you want. After trying to convince him for about 5 minutes, I just gave up because sometimes, people are so hardheaded and so ignorant that nothing you ever say will get through to them.

I see this situation in an even bigger context with the issue surrounding putting the mosque near ground zero.

One of our basic rights as American citizens is the freedom of religion, but we aren't as receptive towards other religions as we should be, especially when it comes to Islam. 9/11 was indeed a horrible day, but associating anyone who is Muslim and anyone who studies the Islamic faith as terrorists is just being ignorant. I cannot believe that people who love this country and love everything it stands for are just willing to turn their backs on fellow Americans because of something that didn't even involve them. This whole situation is extremely shameful to me and I just can't believe there are people who let hatred blind their judgement this much.

I have no idea how to fix this problem. It has to come from the person. If they could only put themselves in a Muslim person's shoes, then they will truly understand how harmful their actions and their words are.

Cassimere Jeremiad

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."- The First Amendment

When the Founding Fathers were writing the Bill of Rights, the first thing they wanted to ensure was that all Americans would have the right to practice their religion of choice in peace. However, recently in New York, there have been hundreds of Americans protesting the construction of the "Ground Zero Mosque" (which is actually an Islamic community center, and about five blocks away from Ground Zero). Americans seem to be ignoring the very principals this country was founded upon. Therefore, a jeremiad I would write for today’s Americans would warn them of the dangers of unequal sharing of constitutional rights. If we start picking and choosing which groups of people are allowed to have these rights, then we become the country that our forefathers never wanted us to become.

Part of the problem, I believe, is the fact that most Americans think that all Muslims are terrorists who want to kill us all. Most of them just want to live their lives in peace without feeling as if they are being discriminated against. Americans just need to suck it up and admit that there is no real reason that the Islamic community center should not be built. They may not like the idea of an Islamic center so close to the site of the World Trade Center, but that’s just tough. Muslims are citizens too and they deserve the same rights as everyone else, and if we deny them these rights, then we become the tyrants our forefathers were escaping when they founded this country.