"How is a 40-foot-tall cross is a 'secular' symbol? It's not a secular symbol when it adorns churches or is worn around people’s necks."
WHILE THE 7-2 RESULT WAS NOT AS BROAD AS PROGRESSIVES HAD FEARED, IT STILL TELLS EVERY NON-CHRISTCUCK THEY'RE LIVING IN SOMEONE ELSE'S COUNTRY.
In the most-watched church-state case of the year, the Supreme Court on Thursday allowed a 40-foot-tall cross-shaped war memorial in Bladensburg, Maryland, to remain on public lands and be maintained with public funds.
Writing for the Court, Justice Samuel Alito said that the cross is not a purely religious symbol because, when it was used for veterans’ graves and memorials, it “became a symbol of their sacrifice.” Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Sonia Sotomayor dissented, emphasizing that “the Latin cross is the foremost symbol of the Christian faith” and that public funds cannot be used to maintain the monument.
The case is a huge symbolic win for the Christian Right, which had made such memorials a centerpiece of their decade-long battle against the so-called “war on religion.” Undoubtedly, religious conservatives will spin the result as a validation of their expansive definition of “religious liberty” and public displays of all kinds: Christmas creches, religious displays in public schools, Ten Commandments displays at courthouses, and so on.
Actually, what was most surprising about the result is how relatively narrow and lopsided it was, with seven justices finding in favor of the memorial, known as the “Peace Cross.”
What’s odd about the Court’s holding is that it seems belied by the controversy itself. On the one hand, the Court says, the monument isn’t forcing anyone to do anything, so why get so upset? On the other hand, Christian conservatives get very upset when such monuments are removed. Is that just a coincidence?
Surely it is not. Surely Christian conservatives rightly understand that 40-foot-tall crosses say something about the place of Christianity in America. They affirm Christian hegemony, Christian centrality, Christian privilege. They support the view that America is a “Christian nation” not just descriptively (in terms of the number of adherents) but normatively as well.
