Its been a few months since we began debating the Ground Zero mosque. Its been a few years since we began debating what our recent wars have been about.

Still today, on September 11th I feel sick in my stomach. All this pro-/anti- Islam stands we have been taking on various issues, and the mention of Islam in positive and negative light at every turn is making me feel disillusioned.

Enough already!

Lets give Islam a break from debate. Lets for once mourn the loss of people ... the loss of peace... the loss of conscience... the loss of genuine respect for religions and religious teachings... Lets mourn our ignorance and our lack of empathy for people.

No more burning korans to show our hate or reading a page of the koran to show our support. Lets stop trivializing Islam with our benighted thinking.

I am lucky to have not lost any friends or family to war. Im also fortunate to have not directly felt the repercussions of religious hate... but I still feel wounded and disturbed by this never-ending hostility we have towards each other, and cant bare to see us trivializing the hurt that victims have been feeling for so many years. I don't know what we can do to help them find peace, but we certainly can build a memorial for those who have suffered hate and violence as a result of fear and intolerance bred my ignorance! Can't we?

It doesn't have to be a mosque. It can just be a universal sanctuary of atonement and enlightenment! (assuming sanctuary, atonement and enlightenment are neutral words!)

I am spending my September 11th thinking about how I would memorialize this decade. The question I am more interested in asking is how would this decade want to be memorialized? What do you think?