As somewhat loathe as I am to interject "religion" into this (interested colleagues can shoot me a PM as to why I qoutemarked the word), I have toe following to contribute as an Orthodox Christian of paternal-side Greek descent.
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That a Spanish architect should design a modern Byzantine church in Lower Manhattan for the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America....
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What difference does the architect's heritage make? If the guy can build a proper Eastern Orthodox temple (i.e. Greek, Russian "onion dome" etc.), let him.
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...based on buildings in Turkey that were used for Islamic worship, goes to the heart of the message the archdiocese says it hopes to send with the $20 million project.
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A little history:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hagia_Sophia
Indeed HS was built as a Greek Orthodox basilica. In Turkey there has been a long history of converting Greek churches to mosques, and more often than not this end was achieved through extreme violence.