Mosque project stirs concerns about the integration of Islam in Germany

Plan stirs concerns about integration
August 22, 2007
BY TOM HUNDLEY

CHICAGO TRIBUNE

COLOGNE, Germany -- Never mind that a local brothel claiming to be
Europe's largest calls itself the Pasha and sports an ersatz arabesque theme.

Some residents of this ancient city on the banks of the Rhine see the brothel as a shining example of their tolerance. But what irks them is that some Muslims want to build a mosque, complete with a dome and minarets.

The residents complain that the minarets would clash with the towering spires of the city's celebrated 13th-Century cathedral. But as the debate heats up, it has revealed a cultural schism that goes much deeper than any disagreement over architectural aesthetics.For Cologne's 120,000 Muslims, most of them of Turkish origin, the $20-million mosque is clearly intended to be more than a house of prayer. It is a symbol of the community's growing sense of pride and confidence, a marker of its determination to take what it sees as its rightful place in German society.

"After 50 years in this country, it is time for us to move out of the mosques in backrooms and abandoned warehouses and to worship in a real mosque," said Mehmet Yildirim, director of the Turkish-Islamic Union for Religious Affairs, the organization behind the construction of the mosque.

But Cardinal Joachim Meisner, spiritual leader of the city's Catholics and a close friend of Pope Benedict XVI, has said that the proposed mosque leaves him with an "uneasy feeling."

Monsignor Rainer Fischer, another Catholic clergyman in the city, said: "The idea of building the mosque has brought up a number of issues that have always been there but were submerged.

"Now they are out in the open."

These issues include Germany's fears about the rising tide of Muslim immigration across Europe, frustrations over the failure to integrate

Germany's 2.7 million Turkish immigrants and gnawing doubts about whether the Turks and other Muslim immigrants truly want to integrate into a Western society.

With Turkey pressing for membership in the European Union, the debate in Cologne has taken on a greater urgency: If Germany is made uneasy by the presence of 2.7 million Turks in its midst, how would Europe integrate an entire nation of 72 million?

'An enriching contribution'

The mosque, which would be one of Europe's largest, has been years in the planning.

The Turkish-Islamic Union held a competition for its design. Out of more than 100 entries, it chose one submitted by Cologne architect Paul Boehm, son of the renowned church architect and Pritzker Prize-winner Gottfried Boehm.

Paul Boehm's design blends elements of Ottoman classicism with cutting-edge modernity. The main worship area is enclosed in a large glass-and-concrete dome, which is intended to suggest openness and transparency.

"We wanted something that was clearly a Cologne mosque, something that would be an enriching contribution to the city," said Yildirim, who noted that money to build the mosque was raised entirely from local donations.

The new mosque would be built on the site of the Turkish-Islamic Union's current mosque, a converted pharmaceutical factory across the street from a gas station and car wash. The location, in a scruffy immigrant section of the city called Ehrenfeld, is less than 2 miles from Cologne's famous cathedral.

"The architecture is, in my opinion, fantastic," said Fischer, who is the Catholic Church's representative on Cologne's council of religions. "I see it as a bridge between Christian Europe and the style of the Ottomans."
Fischer said that his only recommendation would be to scale down the size.

'A symbol of isolation'

Other cities in Germany, including Berlin, have seen the construction of major mosques in recent years. No one other than the far-right fringe raised any real objection to the Cologne project -- at least not until Ralph Giordano, a respected German-Jewish writer, warned that the mosque was an example of the so-called creeping Islamization of Europe.

Given the horrors of Germany's 20th-Century history, the country's politicians and commentators tend to tread carefully in debates that raise questions about religious and ethnic tolerance. But Giordano's comments -- and his credentials as a Holocaust survivor -- seemed to be a green light for others to criticize the proposed mosque.

"The mosque is not a symbol of integration, it's a symbol of isolation, the symbol of an isolated enclave of Oriental culture," said Joerg Uckermann, deputy mayor of the Ehrenfeld district and a member of Chancellor Angela Merkel's Christian Democratic Union.

"I think the minarets are a sign of sharia" -- Islamic law -- "and I do not want that here. This is a Christian city," Uckermann said, openly expressing what many residents would say only in private.

The ferocity of the opposition has come as a shock to members of the
Turkish community. It also angers them.

"They are saying that this is a Christian nation, and there is no space for any other religion? This is against all the principles of freedom and democracy," said Yildirim.

Cologne Mayor Fritz Schramma said that while he is sympathetic to the fears of residents who believe the Muslim community has not done enough to integrate, he believes that allowing the community to build a prestigious place of worship "will be a step toward open dialogue and integration."

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