BY LINCOLN ANDERSON | Local religious leaders and state Senator Brad Hoylman joined an interfaith service at the East Village’s Madina Masjid last month to show solidarity with Muslims in the face of the angry rhetoric coming out of the Republican presidential campaign.
Imam Achmed Abu Sufian of the E. 11th St. mosque led the service.
Anthony Donovan, an advocate for forging ties between the neighborhood’s religious communities, said the area’s spiritual leaders had come there to show their support.
“In these times [with] this injustice and the words that we hear, know that we are together,” Donovan told the gathering, as they sat listening on the mosque’s floor. “We stand up together with you. This is not your challenge. It is not a Muslim challenge. It is our challenge. It is something that we are all working against.”
“We have our neighbors,” the mosque’s Muhammad Shahidullah said. “They’re always with us when we face this kind of calamity.”
He noted that Islam has been in America since the beginning.
“If you trace the history…Muslims served in Washington’s army and they fought against the British colonialists,” he said. “This country is the land of the immigrant.”
Shahidullah said he was happy that members of a nearby church had led the push to take down an ad on the corner that showed a lot of skin and offended local worshipers.
“Some of our sisters from another church, Seventh St. I believe — you see that commercial on the side on the corner,” he said. “Three years ago there was a commercial that was almost naked. These sisters came forward to call the company to take it down. Since then we don’t see any nudity on the commercial on the side.”
Hoylman in his remarks blasted efforts to restrict immigration based on religious grounds.
“We talk about religious texts, I’m going to talk about another text, the U.S. Constitution,” he said. “We’re all Americans, and the strength of our nation, our city and the East Village, lies in the diversity and talents of each and every one of us. We need you. We support you,” he told the Muslim congregants. “You are the essence of our strength. We will continue to surround you with love, support and most of all, solidarity.”
In a follow-up statement, the senator said, “It’s important during this time that New Yorkers show their support for religious and ethnic diversity, which has helped make our city great, and in particular our Muslim community, which is being targeted by hatemongers for partisan political advantage. I’m outraged that Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump would suggest a religious test for immigration into our country. It’s unconstitutional and runs directly counter to the founding principles of our nation.”
Bud Courtney from the Catholic Worker noted he had just fed scores of people at the group’s East Village soup kitchen before coming to the interfaith service.
“We pray for peace, We pray for love,” he said. “This country once was great and can be great, if we learn to love one another.”
Other religious leaders at the event, most of whom also spoke, included Rabbi Larry Sebert of Town and Village Synagogue; Fathers Christopher Calin and Michael Suvak of the Russian Orthodox Cathedral Protection Holy Virgin; Father Sean McGullicutty of Holy Redeemer / Nativity Catholic Church; Rabbi Gavriel Bellino of Sixth Street Community Synagogue; Reverend Chad T. Pack of Middle Collegiate Church, and Father David Kossey of St. Mary’s Church.
In addition, in another interfaith event, members of various local religious congregations will gather on Sun., Jan. 31, for the Seventh Annual Spiritual Sounds, a free concert, from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m., at St. Mark’s Church in the Bowery, at 131 E. 10th St. at Second Ave.
