Connor Shanley

New York, September 11^th, 2001: as the Twin Towers collapsed, the world watched in horror.  Everyone was in shock at the destruction of one of America’s greatest landmarks, but the towers weren’t the only buildings destroyed on 9/11.  On that fateful morning another building was opened before the towers; Matins at St. Nicolas Greek Orthodox Church began at six am.  Matins, thankfully, were over when the first plane struck, and the church was empty when the towers collapsed right on top of it.  St. Nicolas was the only place of worship destroyed on 9/11.  It had been in New York since 1916, but it has taken ten years to finally reach an agreement on it being rebuilt.

In recent years there has been quite a controversy over the building of a mosque at Ground Zero.  Mayor Bloomberg has been in full support of this mosque and has let the proper paper work come through; St. Nicolas is a different story.  It is a story with a lot of mystery and a lot of finger pointing.  The parish of St. Nicolas has been fighting for many years now; St. Nicolas isn’t just a place of worship to the parishioners, however: it has a deep history; it has the history of their ancestors.

St. Nicolas was founded in 1832 by Greek immigrants.  These immigrants were very poor and not very well accepted in the local community.  They had a hard time finding funds to pay the priest, let alone build a building.  The church was started in a house on Liberty Street in New York.  For the Greeks it was their place of worship that still reminded them of home.  To those immigrants, it allowed them to hold gatherings and talk about their old country.  In the eastern United States, this is how Orthodoxy spread; it was carried to America by immigrants.

The church continued switching from house to house.  The church’s community was growing quickly, though, and house churches were no longer working, so in 1899 the church moved outside.  The church had no permanent building because the Greek Archdiocese couldn’t raise money for it.  The Greek immigrants were very poor at this point in time; they were struggling to make ends meet.  Then, in 1916, a bishop of the Russian Archdiocese, (Saint) Raphael made an appeal back to Russia to send funds to help the struggling Orthodox community of New York.  The letter sent back to Russia did not make it into the hands of the church authorities but rather into the Tsar’s.  He gave a very generous donation; the amount is still unknown, but it was enough for the construction of a new church building.

The building itself was one of the last gifts ever given by a Tsar to a foreign country.  After the building went up, it didn’t just serve as a house of worship but also as a gathering place for all Orthodox Christians.  It was an important staple in the community until the day it was destroyed.  St. Nicolas was the only religious non-World Trade Center building destroyed on 9/11.  The Orthodox community lost one of the oldest standing Orthodox churches on the east coast.  Perhaps more shocking than the church’s destruction, however, is how long it has taken just to get a deal to rebuild it.  It has taken ten years just to make a deal on beginning construction.  Both sides don’t trust each other, and the outcome of the current deal still looks bleak according to the Greek Archdiocese.

The confusion started in 2003, when the Greek Archbishop went to go meet with the head of the New York Port Authority to discuss reconstruction efforts.  The appointment never happened.  The Port Authority said no appointment was scheduled and that he’d have to come back.  The Archbishop did come back at a later time, but the Port Authority did not offer much help.  Negotiations on the rebuilding of the church would take place over ten years.  Every time the two sides would reach an agreement, a little while later the other side would ask for more.  The church was asking for some funds in the form of a loan to help the rebuilding process; when that happened in 2008, the Port Authority stopped all discussion.

The church was outraged, but it could do nothing.  The church and the Port Authority were locked in a stalemate.  Both sides, of course, blamed each other for the fact no agreement could be reached.  Mayor Bloomberg also got his say in the matter; he wanted to raise the price of the building permit of the new church by 5 million dollars.  This was just kicking a man while he was down — the church at this point had decided to yield somewhat to the Port Authority, but when Mayor Bloomberg asked for the raise in permit cost, the church took it as an insult.

What Mayor Bloomberg didn’t realize was he got himself involved in a case that would show his own hypocrisy more than anything else he’d done while in office.  When Mayor Bloomberg raised the price and talks started to stall, it was in 2010, right at the height of the “Ground Zero Mosque” debate.  Mayor Bloomberg defended the mosque by talking about freedom of religion and equality for all.

The Mayor wanted to build a mosque at Ground Zero, but he refused to even try to help St. Nicolas, the only place of worship destroyed in the 9/11 attacks.  The debate of there being a mosque at Ground Zero is a debate for another time.  The point is Mayor Bloomberg defending the rights of the mosque by saying it will show “American principals of equality” is just a lie, really.  He treated the Muslims better than the Christians.  He was going to charge the Church more to rebuild than he was going to charge the mosque to start building.  That was his plan, but some news organizations got ahold of the story.

Fox News was the first tv station to run a nationwide story on the church.  It was now becoming a point of public outrage in New York City.  Eventually, the mayor yielded; he dropped the permit price back to normal.  After that, talks started back up, and after much passionate debate and arguing, the Port Authority and the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese reached an agreement in October of 2011.  The agreement states the Port Authority will give the church land three blocks from its old location, and the Port Authority will also give 20 million dollars to help make the building’s parking garage bomb-proof.

This story will not be the last of its kind.  In modern day America is an obsession of being politically correct.  This means we should all be more accepting of other cultures and religions; what this is starting to lead to, however, is a disdain for Christianity.  Christianity does teach to respect people of other backgrounds, but it also says that those religious backgrounds are wrong.  In this new politically correct world some of the media and people in charge are trying to make, there will be no such thing as “right” or “wrong” — only what one’s culture teaches.  This goes against Biblical Christianity, and as a result the backlash against Christianity will be harsh; it is already seen in the media.  Christians are often pictured as narrow minded and judgmental.  We must show love to all humans, even the lost ones, instead.  The warning signs are there: Christianity is no longer “politically correct,” and it will be treated that way in the media and by government officials, such as Mayor Bloomberg.

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