CHRISTIANOFOBIA: EMPIRE STATE BUILDING NO LIGHTS FOR MOTHER TERESA’S 100th BIRTHDAY

WOULD YOU HONOR A MASS MURDERER OR A HUMANITARIAN? Why did the Empire State Building honor the Chinese Communist Revolution (that killed 77 million people) and not Mother Teresa, the selfless nun who dedicated her life to serving sick and poor people from different faiths and nationalities? August 26th marked the 100th anniversary of her birth, but the Empire State Building Lighting Partners snobbed Mother Teresa and denied a request to have blue and white tower lights to honor her humanitarian work.
EMPIRE STATE BUILDING: Mao Zedong = Yes. Mother Teresa = No. “Last year the Empire State Building shone in red and yellow lights to honor the 60th anniversary of the Chinese Communist Revolution. Yet under its founder, Mao Zedong, the Communists killed 77 million people. In other words, the greatest mass murderer in history merited the same tribute being denied to Mother Teresa.” “Mother Teresa received 124 awards, including the Nobel Peace Prize, the Presidential Medal of Freedom and the Congressional Medal of Freedom. She built hundreds of orphanages, hospitals, hospices, health clinics, homeless shelters, youth shelters and soup kitchens all over the world, and is revered in India for her work. She created the first hospice in Greenwich Village for AIDS patients. Not surprisingly, she was voted the most admired woman in the world three years in a row in the mid-1990s. But she is not good enough to be honored by the Empire State Building.” Empire State Building’s Lighting Tradition: “Illuminating the 102-story Manhattan skyscraper in different colors is a tradition. The building, a centerpiece of the city’s skyline, has been lit up for the release of Mariah Carey’s album in 2008, for the 25th anniversary of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles in 2009, for religious holidays such as the end of Ramadan and Easter and for Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Day” and more. Empire State Building has honored religious figures/organizations before: ” When John Cardinal O’Connor died in 2000, the Empire State Building was lighted in red and white; in 2005, when Pope John Paul II died, the tower lights were extinguished in his honor; also in 2005, the tower was aglow in yellow, red and blue in tribute to the 125th anniversary of the Salvation Army; and every year the colors red, black and green are lit in memory of Rev. Martin Luther King.”	Empire State Building lights honored communist China's colors (left) and hyped Mariah Carey and blue M&Ms, but snubbed Mother Teresa. (NY Post)

	MOTHER TERESA OF CALCUTTA (1910-1997): Her life “bore witness to the joy of loving, the greatness and dignity of every human person, the value of little things done faithfully and with love, and the surpassing worth of friendship with God.” “Yet her inspiration was not limited to those with religious vocations.” She formed various organizations for “people of many faiths and nationalities with whom she shared her spirit of prayer, simplicity, sacrifice and her apostolate of humble works of love.” “By 1997, Mother Teresa’s Sisters numbered nearly 4,000 members and were established in 610 foundations in 123 countries of the world.” Mother Teresa “left a testament of unshakable faith, invincible hope and extraordinary charity.”

	MOTHER TERESA BIRTHDAY CELEBRATIONS WORLDWIDE (Photos): INDIA – An Indian lady prays for Mother Teresa An Indian Catholic prays during a special mass commemorating the birth centenary of Mother Teresa, shown in a portrait, at the Cathedral Immaculate Heart of Mary and Mother Teresa, the first cathedral dedicated to Mother Teresa, in Baruipur, outskirts of Calcutta, India, Monday, Aug. 23, 2010. (AP Photo/Bikas Das)
	INDIA – People from different religions pay tribute to Mother Teresa People from different religions pay tribute to Mother Teresa at a function held to start celebrations marking the centenary of her birth, in New Delhi, India, on Tuesday, Aug. 24, 2010. Mother Teresa was born on Aug. 26, 1910. (AP Photo/Saurabh Das)
	MACEDONIA – Prayer in Mother Teresa’s native town Prayer beside Mother Teresa’s monument, in her native town of Skopje, Macedonia, during a ceremony to mark the centennial of her birth, on Thursday, Aug. 26, 2010. Mother Teresa was born in Skopje as Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu on Aug. 26, 1910. (AP Photo/Boris Grdanoski) Born to Albanian parents in what is now Skopje in Macedonia, Mother Teresa went to India in 1929. She was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1979. She died in 1997 after a lifetime spent caring for hundreds of thousands of destitute and homeless poor in Calcutta, for which she came to be called the ‘saint of the gutters.”
	INDIA – Tibetan Buddhist Lama joins the celebration Head of the Missionaries of Charity Sister Mary Prema, right, hands over a candle to the Karmapa Lama OgyenTrinley Dorje, the No. 3 lama in Tibetan Buddhism, during Mother Teresa’s centennial birth anniversary in Calcutta, India, Thursday, Aug. 26, 2010. Hundreds of nuns, bishops and volunteers attended a Mass on Thursday marking the 100th anniversary of the birth of Mother Teresa. (AP Photo)
	INDIA – Special Exhibition Train for Mother Teresa A railway policeman walks past a special exhibition train on Mother Teresa, portrait seen, inaugurated to mark her birth centenary in Calcutta, India, Thursday, Aug. 26, 2010.  The train will travel to different parts of India in next six months. (AP Photo/Bikas Das)
	ALBANIA – Catholic Mass to commemorate Albanian-born Mother Teresa Archbishop Ramiro Moliner Ingles leads the Mass, during a ceremony to celebrate the centennial of the birth anniversary of Mother Teresa, at a Catholic cathedral named after her, in Vau i Dejes, Albania on Thursday, Aug. 26, 2010. Hundreds of Catholics in Albania have held a Mass to commemorate the centenary of the birth of Nobel peace laureate Mother Teresa. Men and women in traditional folk costumes, school children, nuns and bishops filled the courtyard of a cathedral named after Mother Teresa, who was of Albanian origin, in Vau i Dejes, 110 kilometers (nearly 70 miles) north of the capital, Tirana. (AP Photo/Hektor Pustina)
	ROME – Mass at the Basilica of San Damaso Cardinal Angelo Comastri, right, spreads incense in front of a portrait of Mother Teresa during a Mass marking the 100th anniversary of her birth, at the Basilica of San Damaso, in Rome, Thursday, Aug. 26, 2010.  (AP Photo/Gregorio Borgia)
	NEW YORK – Billboards in Times Square illuminated to honor her Billboards in Times Square are illuminated in blue during a lighting ceremony in honor of Mother Teresa’s 100th birthday, Thursday, Aug. 26, 2010, in New York. (AP Photo/Diane Bondareff)
	NEW YORK – Crowd outside of Empire State Building People attend a rally led by the Catholic League outside the Empire State Building in New York, Thursday, Aug. 26, 2010, to protest the decision by the building owners to not light the top in blue and white to honor the 100th birthday of Mother Teresa. (AP Photo/Diane Bondareff)
	Pope Benedict remembered Mother Teresa

	U.S. Postal Service honors Mother Teresa with a commemorative stamp “The stamp — set to be released on Aug. 26, which would have been Mother Teresa’s 100th birthday — will recognize the 1979 Nobel Peace Prize winner for her humanitarian work, the Postal Service announced last month.” “Noted for her compassion toward the poor and suffering, Mother Teresa, a diminutive Roman Catholic nun and honorary U.S. citizen, served the sick and destitute of India and the world for nearly 50 years,” the Postal Service said in a press release. “Her humility and compassion, as well as her respect for the innate worth and dignity of humankind, inspired people of all ages and backgrounds to work on behalf of the world’s poorest populations.” Atheist Group Blasts Postal Service for Mother Teresa Stamp, but USPS defends it: “Postal Service spokesman Roy Betts expressed surprise at the protest, given the long list of previous honorees with strong religious backgrounds, including Malcolm X, the former chief spokesman for the Nation of Islam, and the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., a Baptist minister and co-founder of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. “In fact we honored Father Flanagan in 1986 for his humanitarian work. This has nothing to do with religion or faith,” Betts told FoxNews.com.”
CHRISTIANOPHOBIA: Refers to the phenomenon of Intolerance and Discrimination Against Christians, which is “the denial of equal rights of Christians and the social marginalization of Christians. The term “intolerance” refers to the social dimension, the term “discrimination“, to the legal. Such intolerant and discriminatory behavior results from opposition to individual traits of the Christian faith or moral positions that are intrinsically part of the Christian faith, or from a negative categorical bias against Christians or Christianity as a whole. It leads to attacks on the social level (such as negative stereotyping or social exclusion), on the legal level (for example through a discriminatory law or a bias court verdict) and on the political level (exclusion from the public sphere; a resolution of a parliament; etc.).”