The businessman who is backing the Islamic center near Ground Zero is real estate developer Sharif El-Gama. Did you know his mother was Catholic? He sat down for an interview recently with Scott Pelley of “60 Minutes:
Pelley: Who are you?El-Gamal: I’m an American, a New Yorker, born in Methodist Hospital Brooklyn, to a Polish Catholic mother and an Egyptian father.
Pelley: Let me make sure I have this straight. You are a Muslim who married a Christian girl. Your mother is Catholic. And you joined the Jewish Community Center on the West Side of Manhattan.
El-Gamal: I did. That’s New York, though. That’s New York.
Indeed. There’s more from the interview, plus video, at the link.
posted August 30, 2010 at 8:22 pm
And to think that some folks think that folks with different religions can’t get along! Obviously if this man is any example, we need more interfaith marriages!
posted August 30, 2010 at 9:39 pm
Pagan sis. what we need is repentance and baptism in the Name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The object is not to get along, the object is to save souls.
posted August 31, 2010 at 7:26 am
According to Wikipedia Adolph Hitler attended Catholic elementary school as a child so one would have to assume that his mother was also at least quasi-Catholic. How about Fidel Castro’s mother and Hugo Chavez’s mother and ….etc. etc.
posted August 31, 2010 at 10:15 am
Argumentum ad hominem is not just for freshmen English students, apparently.
posted August 31, 2010 at 5:51 pm
Deacon Greg,
Why do you allow an ad in your blog that shows people how to convert to Islam? Do you have any control over this, or is this a web generated ad? Just wondering.
How to Convert to Islam
How to convert and become a Muslim with Live Help by 1-to-1 chat
posted August 31, 2010 at 7:17 pm
KM …
I wasn’t aware such an ad was appearing on the site. I’ll report it to my editor and, hopefully, it will be taken down…
Thank you for the heads up.
Deacon Greg.
posted August 31, 2010 at 11:19 pm
Panthera has a good point.
Perhaps having a Catholic Mother is no guarantee of predestination.
An ad hominem, also known as argumentum ad hominem (Latin: “to the man”), is an attempt to link the validity of a premise to a characteristic or belief of the person advocating the premise.[1] The ad hominem is a classic logical fallacy.[2] The argumentum ad hominem is not always fallacious, for in some instances questions of personal conduct, character, motives, etc., are legitimate and relevant to the issue.
Why didn’t I think of that?
posted September 1, 2010 at 12:07 pm
El-Gamal first said he didn’t hit the man, but arrest documents obtained by CBS 2 showed he later conceded “his face could have run into my hand.” Oh yeah, nothing but peace & love flowing from the mosque that this clown builds with funding from????? Invite El-Gamal into a dark alley where he wants to shove a mosque in the faces of 911 victim families and he might wake up to discover that “his face ran into quite a few of their hands.”
posted September 1, 2010 at 2:36 pm
Deacon Kandra,
The above post by “Truth” at 12.07 PM is precisely the hateful rhetoric which we, as Christians must oppose.