An idea came up in one of my conversations today about the terrorist attack in Orlando by an Islamic terrorist who had declared his allegiance to ISIS.
Perhaps we need to raise people’s awareness of the nature of these attacks by the founding of a …
National Memorial for the Fallen Killed by Radical Islamic Terrorists.
It should be situated at the Mall in Washington DC.
Perhaps it could be made of the hard bloody-red stone, porphyry.
It should have each group under a header indicating the place and the date, in chronological order.
There should probably be a provision made for expansion.
For now, prayers for the fallen and their families, and prayers for the defeat of terrorists and confusion to our enemies.
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If the government won’t do this, perhaps this would be a great ecumenical project. We keep hearing that churches should work together. This is a project I’d support with prayers and funds.
We are told to pray for our enemies. Each day I pray that all people will covert their lives to Christ.
I also propose the composition of a Litany for the Conversion of Islamist Terrorist Thugs.
St. Francis of Assisi…
St. Clare of Assisi…
Sts. Nunilo and Alodia…
St. Lawrence of Brindisi…
Blessed Anthony of Neyrot…
The problem is to distinguish between Muslims and “Islamic Extremists”
The 9/11 Museum attempts to do it this way:
One could add St. Antonio Primaldo and the other 812 Martyrs of Otranto to the Litany suggested by StJoansPage, with grateful memory of their canonization just over 3 years ago by Pope Francis.
But what is one to say of the statement released by Fr. Lombardi (as reproduced by Edward Pentin)? If, as jhayes suggests, “The problem is to distinguish between Muslims and ‘Islamic Extremists’”, there does not seem to be much help, here.
Referring to “this new manifestation of homicidal folly and senseless hatred” does not go very far toward any kind of clarity or nuance I can see. “We all hope that ways may be found, as soon as possible, to effectively identify and contrast the causes of such terrible and absurd violence which so deeply upsets the desire for peace of the American people and of the whole of humanity.”
Who is this “we all” and the “all of us” of the first sentence? Various publications of ISIS which I have seen quoted (issues of Dabiq and other things), and (so I have heard) their propaganda videos (especially the one with those slain on a beach whom many would describe as martyrs, which apparently includes their idea of an exposition of Church history at some length) would seem to provide an easy way “effectively [to] identify […] the causes of such terrible and absurd violence”, or many such causes of much of such violence (many of whose perpetrators go to great lengths to explain why they do not consider it “absurd”).
As to “the whole of humanity”, do Fr. Lombardi and the authors really mean to exclude the numerous perpetrators, and those who variously support, celebrate, and seek to emulate them from “humanity”? As for “the American people”, sadly the latest (‘apparent’?!) jihadi was an American citizen, as were various of his predecessors.
Great idea Fr. Z. Let’s include those killed by the Barbary Pirates.
Semper Gumby,
Yes!
A lot of people down the years may have gotten a glimpse of the back-history of the Barbary Pirates (especially as slavers) from reading Robinson Crusoe (unless they only read an abridgement or retelling), but a book from a few years ago called Pirates of Barbary: Corsairs, Conquests, and captivity in the Seventeenth-Century Mediterranean by Adrian Tinniswood gives a lot more of the history, going back to the 1500s.
Kind of strangely following on the heels of the proper plural of ‘gin and tonic’ discussion, is a part of Mr. Obama’s media meeting earlier today with respect to being “inspired by various extremist information that was disseminated over the Internet. All those materials are currently being searched, exploited”. “Various” sounds plural, but “various […] information” takes the singular verb form “was”. Then, suddenly, “All those materials” are sensibly taking the plural verb form “are” – but what are they, or where did they come from? Do “All these materials”= “various […] information”? Maybe Mr. Obama would support a Victims of “various extremist information” memorial.
But he seems to have other fish to fry more urgently (or is he just insisting on how: “we will find that there are connections regardless of the particular motivations of this killer, there are connections between this vicious, bankrupt ideology and general attitudes towards gays and lesbians, and unfortunately that is — that’s something that the LGBT community is subject to, not just by ISIL, but by a lot of groups that purport to speak on behalf of God around the world.” The “particular motivations of this killer” seem less important than “connections between this vicious, bankrupt ideology and general attitudes towards gays and lesbians” on the part of “a lot of groups that purport to speak on behalf of God around the world.” Got that, bitter clingers?
49 new names for the memorial :(