That’s because this is a story that has been playing out in Europe for some time, with results ranging from restrictions on religious liberty to a worsening of tensions between Muslims and non-Muslims. America cannot afford to go down the same path.

Everything in, above and around Ground Zero is personal for Tim Brown, a retired New York City firefighter who used to work at the World Trade Center and lost dozens of friends on Sept. 11, 2001.

I refer to it as an Islamic building because the ongoing fight about whether it is a mosque or a cultural center is irrelevant. Typically, if you are in favor of the building’s construction, you refer to it as the latter and if opposed to it, as the former.