This County tried a religious experiment on the public court house lawn in Leesburg, at taxpayers’s expense, and it went terribly wrong – making us a national laughing stock once again.
Some Christians wanted to place a crèche and other religious symbols in the public square -- on our courthouse lawn.
This was constitutionally impermissible under the First Amendment for the Board of Supervisors to pass a public ordinance that had as its purpose - the “establishment of religion.” The first clause of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution guarantees separation of church and state -- so that the government may not underwrite or prefer or “establish” any religion over any other religion.
While the government may not establish any religion, by the very next provision in the First Amendment, neither may any government interfere with the “free exercise” of religion. What that means is that Christians, and those who follow any other religious belief, are free to use any place of worship or any yard of any private home to host whatever religious worship or practices they wish any time of the year.
Our community leaders, however, skirted the prohibition against establishing religion, ignoring the fact that there were good and sufficient places to practice religious rites off of public property, by acting as if, this were instead, an exercise of free speech. Thus did this County allow some Christians to foist their religious views on a pluralistic community having diverse religious beliefs and unbelief.
So insistent were some Christians in their efforts to establish their religion as pre-eminent over others that they did not comprehend, respect or tolerate the views of others.
Exhibit A is the much-publicized and not-so-covert smashing of a skeletal Santa hung on a symbolic Cross, taken apart piece by piece, until it disappeared entirely, and reportedly while under surveillance by law enforcement (Inspector Clousseau we presume).
Politicians wrung their hands and whined that this was an offensive and un-Christian exhibit. There were crocodile tears at its destruction. They were so blinded by their intolerance for any view that differed from their pre-conceived view of what was acceptable, they failed to appreciate that this artful satire was entirely Christian, condemning the crass materialism of the post-thanksgiving retail sales orgy that vitiates the true meaning of Christmas. One Christian pastor from Loudoun said the display was representative of “[t]he materialistic mugging of a religious tradition that has created a ‘Christmas market’ and ‘crucified’ a transcending spirit of Christmas ….” He compared this current artistic expression to Jesus’ historic objection to the “market around [the] ritual sacrifices in the Temple in Jerusalem.” After all, this pastor said, if Jesus and his followers had not protested that Jerusalem “market,” among other controversial teachings of his public ministry, Jesus would have never been sacrificed on the cross, and his birth would have had no historic or religious significance.
We shouldn’t need to be reminded that the First Amendment “freedom of speech” protects speech that some find intolerable, outrageous, even offensive -- the only brand of speech that truly needs protection. Here we have Christians and other disapproving an entirely Christian message because they object to its presentation.
Other Christians – or so it appears - pulled down the fairly moderate lawn display of the Atheists that was both respectful in tone and presentation. No question that this was not Christian.
In the end, the Christians who insisted on this pretext of “free speech” so that they could “establish” their religious belief couldn’t even respect the freedom of others to speak in opposition or even to speak with a difference in emphasis than they preferred or approved.
Going forward this New Year, we must not allow any sect of any religious belief to use the public square at taxpayers’ sufferance to establish their belief, and we must recognize that pretending that this is free speech when it is really about establishing and preferring one religion over another doesn’t work – especially not when some Christians can’t respect the rights of other to speak in disagreement or in a manner they disapprove.
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