A Short Tribute

This question was sent from the famous city of New York, where many of our Jewish brethren purchase houses of prayer from non-Jews and make them into synagogues and study houses - asking whether this is permitted and is the correct thing to do. There is yet another reason to discuss and permit this, for non-Jews in our day do not engage in idol worship…There was a time, when priests controlled the Christian people and led them in keeping with their own spirit, when they would fabric images and order the masses to bow down before them. But in our time, it is certain and known by all that such images serve only for commemoration. Even if they place them in their houses of prayer, they are only ornaments, and in their mind the building in which they are placed is itself an ornament or decorative object, so that it is not forbidden, by law, to enjoy it or sit within it.