Recent Islamic terror attacks in NYC and Minnesota

I have tangential connections to the place where the recent Islamic terror bomb was planted in New York City and to the city where the Islamic terrorists stabbed people in a mall in my native Minnesota.

First, I went to St. Cloud State for a year before transferring to the University of Minnesota.

Next, the bomb in the Chelsea area of Manhattan….

I’ve been listening to talking heads wonder why the Islamic terror bomb was placed where it was, on 23rd between 6th and 7th.  Next to the Islamic terror bomb site is the now-closed Catholic Church of St. Vincent de Paul.  I stayed at the rectory there many times.   Of course the church is closed now, but it is unlikely that an Islamic terrorists would know that.  There would not have been a place to hide a bomb on the steps of the church.  But there was scaffolding and dumpster nearby.

16_09_19_map_01

There may be other reasons for the Islamic terrorists to have chosen that area: Chelsea is, or at least was, known also for its large presence of homosexuals.

This is entirely speculation on my part.  But that fact is, the bomb was right next to a Catholic church.

Speaking of speculation, I suppose one might wryly ask this question: Is this Islamic terrorist bomber also a homosexual, as was the murderer in Orlando who shot up the “gay” (I detest what’s been done to that word) club?

In any event, we are going to see a lot more of this. Please, everyone, give thought to what I have constantly asked: situational awareness.

Meanwhile, may I remind you of a useful book?  HERE

Defeating Jihad: The Winnable War by Sebastian Gorka. (UK HERE)

In this book, Gorka describes one of the reasons why these people choose terror.

According to the Pakistani general, there is only one target of importance in war: the soul of the enemy. The infidel foe must be converted to Islam or crushed. Lastly, since the only target that matters in war is the soul of the infidel, Malik concludes that the most effective weapon in war isterror. Here we see the relevance of his book to groups like Al Qaeda and ISIS. The enemy’s belief system must be utterly destroyed, and terror is the most effective way to do that. That is why 9/ 11 was so important. It is the highly symbolic suicide attacks, the crucifixions, the beheadings, the bombings of civilian crowds, and the videos of immolations that will destroy the will of the infidel to go on.

According to the Quranic concept of war, and because these terrorists are inspired to bring about the eschatological fulfillment of their religion, they wage war on the souls of the non-Muslim or, in their view, insufficient-Muslim.  Their war has an eschatological view.  They must destroy the spirit of their enemy.  This is why they use terror and why they commit atrocities which they record and broadcast.

Pray…

Deus, qui conteris bella, et impugnatores in te sperantium potentia tuae defensionis expugnas: auxiliare famulis tuis, implorantibus misericordiam tuam; ut, inimicorum suorum feritate depressa, incessabili et gratiarum actione laudemus.

O God, who bringest wars to nought and shieldest by Thy power all who hope in Thee, overthrowing those that assail them; help Thy servants who implore Thy mercy; so that the fierce might of their enemies may be brought low, and we may never cease to praise and thank Thee.

Sts. Nunilo and Alodia, pray for us.
St. Lawrence of Brindisi, pray for us.
St. Pius V, pray for us.
Martyrs of Otranto, pray for us.
Our Lady of Victor, pray for us.
St. Michael the Archangel, defend us in battle.

About Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Fr. Z is the guy who runs this blog. o{]:¬)
This entry was posted in Semper Paratus, The Coming Storm, The future and our choices, The Religion of Peace and tagged , . Bookmark the permalink.

26 Comments

  1. DisturbedMary says:

    I thought the same thing. Big, beautiful, Catholic, St. Vincent de Paul is right there. And of course, no one in the news even mentioned the proximity to a Catholic Church. Don’t you think it would be different if there was a mosque or a synagogue close by? [There is a synagogue nearby, between 7th and 8th on 23rd.]

  2. bethv says:

    You may not have been aware of this follow up report from the FBI about the Orlando bomber, “the FBI has found no evidence so far to support claims by those who say Mateen had gay lovers or communicated on gay dating apps, several law enforcement officials said. “http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-orlando-gay-fbi-20160623-snap-story.html. Your speculation about the Catholic Church adjacent to where the bombs were placed is very interesting and chilling.

  3. HyacinthClare says:

    How do you respond when certainly people-who-will-remain-nameless say that (1) talking “mean” or (2) being insufficiently “welcoming” causes these people to do acts of terror?

  4. LarryW2LJ says:

    The perpetrator has been captured in Linden, NJ. Supposedly, his family, who owns a fried chicken joint in Elizabeth, NJ had been suing the town and its police department for what they feel was “Anti-Muslim harassment and aggression”.

    Of course, when your civil lawsuit doesn’t seem to be gaining traction, and you feel you’re being unjustly discriminated against – what do you do? You place bombs in Seaside, NJ, New York City and Elizabeth, NJ – right? I mean that’s what anyone else would do – right?

    Sorry for the sarcasm – but this one REALLY hits too darn close to home.

  5. Sword40 says:

    Our FSSP parish is in a poor part of town. We hire weekend security for the Masses and a number of us carry concealed. Yes, we try to be very aware. It was a little spooky at the Vigil Mass last Easter. As we were outside next to the side walk, the men formed a security ring around the priest and the women and children. (just to be on the safe side)

  6. JTH says:

    “…that will destroy the will of the infidel to go on.”

    Working well in Europe and to a lesser degree in U.S.

  7. Elizabeth M says:

    It is not coincidence, and I have thought that from the moment I heard of the bombing. This was Our Lady’s intersession working – a small victory because no one was killed. She was protecting them. The time left for evil is getting shorter and shorter. More prayers, fasting, use of the sacraments, and she will have her Victory.

  8. ChgoCatholic says:

    The first thing I went searching for was which Catholic Church was on W 23rd. I was sorry to hear that it had been closed. I actually saved the article on the church’s current legal disposition, because I knew you’d be posting about it! Immediately, it struck me and my husband as something of potential importance.

  9. NBW says:

    I didn’t know the bomb was next to a Catholic Church. They are waging a war on Christians and not a peep is heard from the biased news. It’s sickening.

  10. Charles E Flynn says:

    From USPSA Shooter, NRA Instructor Shot, Killed Somali Man on Stabbing Rampage:

    “Jason Falconer is the man who shot and killed the 22-year-old Somali maniac who went on a stabbing spree at a mall in St. Cloud, Minnesota, on Saturday.
    Falconer is the owner of Tactical Advantage, a shooting range and tactical training facility. He was also formerly the police chief of the Albany (MN) Police Department and is still a part-time police officer.  Falconer is an NRA instructor and a member of the United States Practical Shooting Association, a competitive pistol shooting association.”

    Tactical Advantage is in Waite Park, Minnesota.

  11. Charivari Rob says:

    “…the bomb was right next to…”

    THAT bomb was right next to that church.

    He’s believed to be involved in the placing of “devices” (of greater or lesser explosiveness) at three other locations in NY and NJ.

  12. Kathleen10 says:

    We have always had enemies. In prior times the enemy was named and Americans were of a single mind about who the enemy was. Americans of that prior era were in agreement that a threat needed to be neutralized. We trusted the government to do that. Our president and related officials acted in a manner that demonstrated to the American people we were of one mind and would be victorious. Our military was fully funded and totally supported.
    Today the enemy, despite vocally and repeatedly stating they are at war with us, wish to kill us and take over our land, make good on that threat repeatedly, kill and maim thousands of our people, but our government will not take them at their word, and make excuses as to why their words cannot be so. The government in fact, now bends over backward to give money to foreign governments known for making threats against us and funding Islamic terrorism. Yet we make deals with them, release enemy combatants so they can fight against us again, and blame anybody but Muslims.
    Islam is not the problem. Our government is not even the problem. The problem is that Americans no longer think clearly and rationally about Muslims or the government. If we had the American population of 1940, we would not see what we are seeing now, thousands of enemy combatants flooding into our nation. We would not see Catholics who were voting for Hillary Clinton, nor other people of just plain goodwill. We would see Americans who are so committed to the safety and wellbeing of their children and grandchildren’s future that they would name the enemy and be united in resolve to defeat this threat whatever it takes. Whatever it takes.
    Where is that resolve today!
    Maiming, raping, and murdering, are abstract to a lot of people, until it happens to them or a loved one. How cavalier we have become! We are about to get a full dose of reality.
    To vote for Hillary Clinton, in these times, is absolutely insane.

  13. The Astronomer says:

    I grew up a block off of Elmora Avenue in Elizabeth, NJ and attended St. Genevieve RC Church & grammar school during the late 1960s.

    I know where this clown lived and worked. You’re right, Father, they’re here and it’s going to amp up severely.

    Our Lady of Fatima, Pray for us.

  14. JARay says:

    I was reading only the other day that the Islamists are intending to attack Rome itself and are gathering weapons to bring this about, even to the extent of stocking bows and arrows to help bring this about. Bows and arrows are not prohibited weapons in Italy. What I was reading concerned the vision which Our Lady showed Lucia of the Bishop clad in white stumbling over ruins in Rome. And there are two bishops clad in white right now in Rome.

  15. Giuseppe says:

    That was Rev. Gerald Murray’s church. It was a beautiful Francophone church. Lots of devout Haitians.

    The church had a big homeless shelter (I think it’s still there.) And close by is Selis Manor, a home for the disabled and many blind New Yorkers.

    I didn’t see this as a church bombing but more of taking advantage of construction and dumpsters near a homeless shelter and disabled residence (if you see something, say something doesn’t work if you are blind), as well as proximity to the PATH train stop on 23/6. I though he might be going after the people we Catholics value: the poor, the downtrodden, the homeless, the addicted, the disabled, the blind, etc. But he might have been making a Catholic statement, even though the church closed a few years ago.

    Pray for the disabled in Selis manor.

  16. spock says:

    I agree with you Father. I don’t like what’s been done to the “gay” either. That said, there has been a perfectly legitimate term that has been used for a very long time to describe the individuals in question, that term as you know is “Sodomite” and it refers to people who commit the sin of sodomy. Why don’t we use that term? We seem to treat it almost like a racial slang word or something. And when our good Bishops get asked about “gays” or “homosexuals” in the public forum, the question always gets bogged down by a distinction that seemingly only the Bishops make but the rest of us common folk do not, That is having a tendency vs the act of same. I contend that when the majority of people hear the term “gay”, the think the latter, that is, the act. But the term “Sodomite” clearly and unambiguously denotes a praxis. So I contend that is the term we should be using, Not to be bombastic, but to define our terms in the clearest possible way. It’s not about people who have a tendency, it’s about a praxis.

  17. robtbrown says:

    JARay,

    The text does not mention Rome but a large city.

  18. Kerry says:

    HyacinthClare, may I suggest replying with your very best imitation of Eddie Murphy’s laughter!

  19. tskrobola says:

    Kathleen10: spot on regarding Hillary and the entire Democratic Party…even as recently as 10 years ago I had a fair amount of policy views in common with Democrats, although I have never voted for a Democrat candidate, primarily because of their hostility to unborn life.

    Now the Democrats seem to have gone out of their way to disagree with everything I believe in, 100% opposite, 180 degrees around. I can’t believe that any sane person can believe what they say about Islam and terrorism.

    We got incredibly lucky this last week that no one was killed….read Jim Geraghty at National Review on the whole timeline…incredible number of near misses.

    I really can’t stand Trump….I think he was promoted and propelled thru his freak show primary run by a lot of Dem voters and other provocatuers who wanted the GOP to select the wackiest person possible…but now Trump us all we have to stop Hillay and the perma-hoarde of leftist barbarians from ransacking every last vestige of our national identity…this could easily still happen with Trump, even if he might sincerely try and stop the left…but Hillary has demonstrated a passion in this campaign to take every crazy deal of the Obama Administration and the radical left and implement national policies to enact that agenda in every nook and cranny of our society, right down (to) the toilets! Yikes, what a time we live in…feels like were witnessing the premeditated crack up of the west.

  20. Gus Barbarigo says:

    It’s great to see the Martyrs of Otranto included in the litany of holy ones.

    Along with St. Bernard of Clairvaux and Bl. Raymond Lully, another idea for the litany includes Blessed Mark of Aviano (Marco D’Aviano), who was an organizer and chaplain of the victory at Vienna on 9/11 and 9/12, 1683; as a Capuchin, he even had a role in the making of cappuccino!

    http://catholicsaints.info/blessed-mark-of-aviano/

    http://www.wvwnews.net/story.php?id=3261

    http://www.capuchin.org/about/history/saints/detail/1a4

    http://www.nobility.org/2013/08/12/bl-mark-of-aviano/

  21. KateD says:

    HyacinthClare,

    I believe the only way to respond to such statements is to fake cough, cover your mouth and mumble, ‘bull puck-ie” under your breath.

    Seriously, though, there’s a lot of good literature on the subject. You don’t even have to get into it with them. Let the pros present the case. Just humbly suggest that book Father has listed numerous times, ‘Defeating Jihad: The Winable War’, by Sebastian Gorka.

    My loved ones had a similar argument, and I of course did not use the aforementioned response with them. Instead I recommended they check out these YouTube videos of William J. Federer who wrote ‘What Every American Needs to Know about the Qur’an’. Or give them the disc for their car. After listening to it my loved ones did a 180. It’s just a lack of knowledge, and it is a work of mercy to educate the ignorant, right? Plus, everybody wants to be knowledgeable on this topic, so they tend to check it out. Federer is concise and convincing. He does a much better job than I could ever do.

    William J. Fenderer, ‘What Every American Should Know About Islam’:

    https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=xvoLg8KQmXs

  22. KateD says:

    We need to avail ourselves of classes available at our local sportsman clubs. Classes are free or cheap and you don’t have to be a police officer to start competition shooting. The more you practice, the better you get. The people at gun clubs are warm and hospitable and sincerely willing to help novices in anyway they can.

    Plus, it’s fun.

    More resistance may make all the difference in deterring future attacks.

  23. Semper Gumby says:

    Speaking of eschatology, there are several Arabic authors who have sold quite a few “End-Times” books since the 1990s (some of these books have a distinct Hal Lindsey style). Some of these books are novels that involve great battles, an Islamic nuclear attack on Western Europe, and the “Black Flag of Khorasan.” A good article on this is by David Cook in Middle East Quarterly June 1998 titled “Muslim Fears of the Year 2000.”

    An excerpt from Cook’s article:
    “Classical Islam assigns Islam’s holy cities of Mecca and Medina virtually no place in apocalyptic scenarios. To the contrary, very early traditions state that at the end of time the Ka‘ba (the shrine that houses the Black Stone in Mecca) will come to Jerusalem.1 Classical apocalyptic material virtually always has the mahdi make his headquarters in Jerusalem. Islam began in Mecca and will conclude in Jerusalem, observes Bassam Jirrar, a Hamas leader.2” (Bassam Jarrar is also one of the authors discussed by Cook.)

    Some of these books fixate on Rome almost as much as on Jerusalem. Islamic end-times writing is based on the Hadith much more than on the Koran. The Hadith is also where the “Major and Minor Signs” of the Islamic End-times are derived.

  24. SKAY says:

    I agree, Kathleen10.

    http://www.cnbc.com/2016/09/20/george-soros-to-invest-500-million-in-help-for-refugees-through-his-open-society-foundations.html

    Once again we see this socialist atheist billionaire using his money to achieve his open society one world government goals. and open border policies are just one part of his plan. His endorsement of Obama and now Hillary with large donations to them and the Democrat party explains why their views seem to match his. The fact that ISIS has promised to embed their people into the Muslim immigrant population brought in by Obama ( and in the future as promised by Hillary ) is ignored until,of course, the next Islamic terrorist attack. Then once again everyone is “shocked”. The fact that Hillary even has a chance to be elected says to me that common sense in the United States of America has “left the building”.
    Eight years ago a Jesuit priest involved with Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good
    encouraged Catholics in my area to vote for Obama. He said he would be pragmatic on the abortion issue and the social justice issues were much more important. When I looked into that organization I found out that Soros was a donor to that group. His influence showed even then.

    JARay, I read a translated speech given by a Palestinian Muslim cleric stating that first they were going to take care of the Little Satan(Israel) and the Big Satan(US) and then they would go to Rome.
    This was over eight years ago. At the time the reference to Israel and America did not shock me but the reference to Rome did. At that time I was naive.

  25. tealady24 says:

    I agree. I live 10 minutes from Seaside and grew up in Elizabeth and Linden where so many relatives resided. Things haven’t always gone according to plan in my life either, but it would never occur to me to take up with TERRORIST activity. But then again I LOVE my country!

  26. People cavil at the idea of having armed citizens in certain public places; but it appears that in nearly every case, even mentally unbalanced spree killers have the sense to choose targets where they are unlikely to encounter armed resistance. Plus, when somebody starts a murder spree, the instinctive response is to summon the aid of a bunch of armed citizens. Wouldn’t it make sense to have good guys with guns already on the scene? The police can’t be our bodyguards, and in emergencies, seconds count.

    [We know the old phrase, “When seconds count, the police are only minutes away!” That isn’t a criticism of police, of course. They simply can’t be everywhere.]

Comments are closed.