Murfreesboro and The Mosque: A First Amendment Love Story
It has been fascinating to watch a case study in the First Amendment play out in Murfreesboro, TN. On the one hand, you have the Muslim community preparing to build the Islamic Center of Murfreesboro, a large school and community center designed to accommodate its growing population. It’s a great example of the beautiful religious freedom that we enjoy in our country. On the other hand, you have a group of people who are embarrassing our state while exercising their freedom of speech in denouncing the building as a terrorist training site.
Congressional candidate Lou Ann Zelenik, a woman who is yet another example of why I find it impossible to find a Republican politician I want to support these days, said that the Center has the purpose of fracturing the “moral and political foundation of Middle Tennessee.” She also declared the following:
“Until the American Muslim community find it in their hearts to separate themselves from their evil, radical counterparts, to condemn those who want to destroy our civilization and will fight against them, we are not obligated to open our society to any of them.”
Excuse me? OUR society? To whom exactly is this possessive pronoun referring, Ms. Zelenik? If these Muslims are legal residents of our country, and there is no reason to assume they are not, they are as much a part of my society as you are.
Zelenik claims to be a leader of the Tea Party movement in Tennessee. When these guys are waving around their pocket copies of the Constitution, I wonder if they ever take the time to scan that very first part of the Bill of Rights. If you claim to “want your Constitution back,” then you should embrace the fact that a religious organization is freely able to build property in our great nation.
Here’s the truth. Not all Muslims are out to destroy America . . . not even close. Out of all of the Muslim dorm mates I had in college and the two with whom I shared an apartment after graduation, I never felt that I had to sleep with one eye open because one of them might try to shatter my political and moral foundation while I slept.
If a Muslim attacks our country, kill him. If a group threatens our nation under the flag of Islam, attack its members with every resource possible. But, let’s not ignore the First Amendment without cause. It’s sad and dangerous.