The City of Dearborn has reached an agreement with so-called Christian missionaries, whose aggressive proselyting caused a stir at the annual Arab International Festival three years ago.
The settlement is the latest in a string of incidents that has caused largely non-Arabic city officials in Dearborn to do battle with a wide array of protesters who come to the western Wayne County suburb to confront the city's large Mideastern community, many of whose members are Muslim.
According to Niraj Warikoo in the Free Press, the American Freedom Law Center, a conservative legal group cofounded by an Ann Arbor attorney, had filed the lawsuit on behalf of a group of Christian missionaries called Acts 17 Apologetics.
The group said their rights were violated when they were arrested by police in June 2010 at the festival on charges of disturbing the peace. The missionaries were there to try to convert Muslims to Christianity. A jury acquitted the missionaries of most of the charges against them.
Under the terms of the settlement announced today, the city must post an apology on its website for three years. It also must remove a news release and letter on the website from Dearborn Mayor John O’Reilly in 2010 that had criticized Acts 17 Apologetics for “their attack on the City of Dearborn for having tolerance for all religions including believers in the Koran.”
Warikoo writes that last year, a separate group of Christian missionaries called Bible Believers brought a pig’s head mounted on a pole and signs denigrating Islam to the Arab Festival, drawing a heated reaction from some children. Many Muslims abstain from pork.
Quran-burning pastor Terry Jones said he intends to go to the festival this year to preach against Islam. He said the Christian missionary who brought the pig’s head will be with him.
The festival will be moved this year from W. Warren Avenue to Ford Woods Park.
