Re: City of NY Approves Mosque near Ground Zero

In <847a79a3-fb94-441e-9a2f-f3a4b75752ec@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> Fattush <fattuchus@xxxxxxxxx> writes:

Islam is a religion.

Witch craft is a religion. The practice of voodoo and santeria is
considered a religion. But I would not want to see a voodoo or witch
craft "Y" being built.

yeah can you imagine? I can just see the scene, with these crazy-looking
bearded guys swinging chickens over their heads - LIVE chickens - and then
slitting their necks and letting them bleed out. Man, how savage. Wait,
what? Jews do that? Oh, sorry, nevermind.

Once you accept the notion of religion, IMO you have no basis to go around
saying this one is somehow more rational or whatever than that one. All
religions by definition are non-rational. Swinging a chicken over your
head is, objectively, no more nor less rational than lighting a special
candle as a curse or blessing.

If we're going to start judging religions, we can only do so based on the
same behavioral standards we apply to everyone else - if we allow people
to slaughter chickens, then we allow religious people to slaughter
chickens. If we don't allow the removal of beating hearts from human
chests, then we don't allow religious people to cut out hearts from
beating chests.

You can't get into the business of trying to figure out which religions
"make sense" and which don't, because to do so is to itself a religious
opinion and violates the principle of separation of church and state.

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