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thedrifter
03-12-05, 10:18 AM
San Diego and a Few Old Veterans Say "Tear Down that Cross"


3/12/05




For those of you who thought the day would never come in America when a Christian cross would be torn down from a veteran’s memorial, you’re in for a shock. On, March 8, 2005, the San Diego City Counsel voted 5 to 3 to tear down a 43 foot concrete cross from the Mt. Soledad Veteran’s Memorial in San Diego, California. This cross has stood since 1954 and was originally dedicated to veterans of the Korean War.

The Mt. Soledad cross is surrounded by over 1,600 granite plaques commemorating American veterans of all wars, and has served as a gathering place for hundreds of group and private veterans’ memorials and tributes. It also has served as a meeting place for annual Easter sunrise services. Thousands of Christian worshipers honor this monument as a great spiritual, historic and cultural treasure.

But, on March 8, after 15 years of litigation, brought by an atheist and supported by the ACLU, the City Council voted to strike a deal with the atheist, by removing the cross. The City did this in spite of a recent Congressional act signed by our president designating this site a National Memorial and offering to take possession of it. The city did this in spite of offers of free legal aid from two powerful national Christian law centers (the Thomas More Law Center and the Alliance Defense Fund.)

Perhaps even more tragically, the Mt. Soledad Memorial Association, made up of old veterans, but led by a non-veteran bureaucrat, also endorsed the removal of the Christian cross from their own memorial, citing pragmatic reasons, and citing their weariness from 15 years of lawsuits. They also did this in spite of the efforts of their Congressmen to make this a national monument, and in spite of offers of free legal assistance if they would continue to stand up to the atheists.

We all know that evil flourishes when good men do nothing; but what we didn’t know is how easy it would be for a few good men, and our elected officials in the City of San Diego to abandon their sense duty and decency. It was truly a dark day in this corner of America when a few good men stood and professed that was better to strike a deal with a religiously intolerant atheist, than to stand up and fight for their beliefs, or the beliefs of the vast majority of their constituents. What we never imagined, in our country, in our lifetimes, is that some intolerant hate-filled men would be able to hide behind our Constitution and file enough frivolous lawsuits to force a group of venerated American veterans into surrendering their principles and their integrity. When General Douglas MacArthur retired he spoke about a soldier’s code of duty, honor, and country, and then stated that “old soldiers never die, they just fade away.”

I’m sure General MacArthur never contemplated that in fading away, a group of old American veterans would abandon their code of duty, honor, and country, for a new code of “defeatism, pragmatism, and appeasement.” Those great men, honored by the Mt. Soledad cross, who made the ultimate sacrifice, must be looking down with sorrow on the Memorial Association that had promised to preserve this memorial. The Marine motto is Semper Fidelis, or “always faithful.” At least for a few of these old Memorial Association veterans being “always faithful” really meant to only be faithful for 15 years, and then to surrender to legal pressures by an opposition becoming more dedicated to tearing down what we believe than protecting what they were entrusted to preserve.

We should all pray for those men who have forgotten their vows and their code and for those who have exchanged duty, dedication, and even their faith, for political expedience. We should all pray for the American country we now live in, where this cowardly, despicable act of religious intolerance and bigotry is sanctioned in one of our finest cities, and carried out against the most sacred symbol of our faith.

For those of you who want to do more than just pray, write to your Congressional representatives and to our president, beseeching them to act to undo this great injustice before it’s too late and before we insult more than just the hate-filled sensitivities of one atheist and the ACLU.

Mark A. Ginella is an attorney for Dr. John Steel and a former Navy fighter pilot during the Korean War.

Ellie