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| Europe | |
| Public outcry forces church to keep Moor Slayer's statue | |
| 2004-07-22 | |
| St James the Moor Slayer, Spain's patron saint, has notched up another victory. Church officials have been forced to overturn a decision to remove a statue of the saint from the cathedral of Santiago de Compostela in north-west Spain. The statue, an 18th-century work by Jose Gambino which depicts St James on a white charger hacking off the heads of Moors beneath his rampant mount's hooves, was deemed to be offensive to Muslims. However a spokesman for the church, which is Christendom's third holiest site after Rome and Jerusalem and attracts half a million pilgrims each year, said yesterday that, due to public anger over the proposed move, the statue will now remain in place. "It is still here on the same spot. It is not going anywhere," a spokesman for Alejandro Barral, the president of the cathedral's art commission, said. "We have decided that the statue of St James will stay in the cathedral. There is no reason why it should be removed in the near future. For the moment the debate over its future has been suspended."
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| Posted by:tipper |
#12 was deemed to be offensive to MuslimsBy whom, exactly? A "good" moslem wouldn't have any reason to go into a church, so how can they see it and be "offended"? I'm offended by a good portion of the moslems - starting with the Paleos and going right on through the Saudis. Think they'd be interested in removing themselves from public so as not to offend me? |
| Posted by: Barbara Skolaut 2004-07-22 10:33:22 PM |
| #11 http://www.blindchicken.com/~ali/spain2003/santiago/dscn0625.jpg |
| Posted by: Parabellum 2004-07-22 8:17:37 PM |
| #10 Hey, if this dude can pump his own gas then St James can ace a few invading Moors. |
| Posted by: .com 2004-07-22 5:17:44 PM |
| #9 Beloki! |
| Posted by: Shipman 2004-07-22 5:11:05 PM |
| #8 Santiago! |
| Posted by: mojo 2004-07-22 4:20:56 PM |
| #7 Liberalhawk St James could not have been a Moor slayer but his name was the battlecry of the Castilians during the Reconquista. He was the symbol of paople who fought for eight centuries to avoid falling into submission (Islam in Arabic). Pity that 21th century Spaniards had forgotten him. |
| Posted by: JFM 2004-07-22 3:59:19 PM |
| #6 The Statue has now become an official target. |
| Posted by: danking70 2004-07-22 2:10:49 PM |
| #5 Before anyone shouts about PCers changing history, lets be aware that theres no real historical evidence (AFAIK) that St James ever went to Spain, and he certainly never slew any Moors while he was alive - thats all based on him appearing in dreams to various Spanish warriors telling them to go fight. OTOH, if we have to respect the Al Aqsa mosque ...;) |
| Posted by: Liberalhawk 2004-07-22 1:05:55 PM |
| #4 "The statue ... was deemed to be offensive to Muslims" I think I must have missed Zapatero's impassioned speech in response to the threat of Islamic militancy to Spain, but I'm guessing he borrowed from Churchill: "We will not fight them in the train stations, we will not fight them at the polling stations. We will not fight them in Iraq, and we will not fight them in our churches. We will ever surrender!" At least that's on hold in Santiago de Compostela. |
| Posted by: Bulldog 2004-07-22 12:58:47 PM |
| #3 Perhaps they could replace his sword with a white flag. |
| Posted by: A Jackson 2004-07-22 4:14:08 AM |
| #2 If only we could get a Moore-slayer here... Probably have to use a D-9 dozer though, thats the only thing big enough to take lardass moore down. |
| Posted by: OldSpook 2004-07-22 3:39:11 AM |
| #1 A victory for civilization. |
| Posted by: Lucky 2004-07-22 2:14:28 AM |
