ACLJ: Requests Mo' Money for "Cross" Fight

In a email newsflash dated 9/12/06, the ACLJ opined that ..."The ACLU winning this case [concerning the memorial cross on Mt. Soledad in San Diego] could mean that no war memorials across our country would be safe from their grip - not even Arlington Cemetery in Washington, D.C."

Hmmmmmmm. Interesting that they should allude to dead soldiers.

ACLJ--meet Roberta Stewart.

Sgt. Patrick D. Stewart (deceased) and his wife, Roberta Stewart, are of the Wiccan faith. Patrick, a decorated veteran who served in Korea and Operation Desert Storm, died in Afghanistan in 2005 when his helicopter was shot down by unfriendlies.

The problem: the U.S. Department of Veterans' Affairs refuses to put a pentacle, one of the symbols of their faith, on Sgt. Stewart's tombstone in Nevada.

Now, that sounds like religious discrimination to me. (The Lady Liberty League is supporting and providing a great deal of news about Roberta Stewart's plight.)

And where is the ACLJ? Pimping dire threats around the fundamentalist Christian community to try to scare them into sending Jay Sekulow some more money.

Lord have mercy.

I do understand where some Christians might be coming from re. the Mount Soledad Cross. To many of them, I think a cross is just the most solemn and reverent symbol they can think of, so that is why it is used to mark occasions and ideas that are solemn and reverent. But America just *isn't* a Christian nation. Sorry. I learned that it is incorrect to conflate the "Founding Fathers" with the "Puritan Fathers." Charles II rescinded the Massachusetts Bay Colony's original charter in 1684. The Puritans' "City on a Hill" experiment failed. Sorry (again). This is a very interesting subject of study for those who are interested. I recommend The Founding Fathers and the Place of Religion in America by Frank Lambert. It's worth every penny, IMO.

But what the "Founding Fathers" set up still works today--that is, when the Christian fundamentalists (and self-interested parties like the ACLJ) aren't trying to steal away everyone else's rights.

Meanwhile, Roberta Stewart can't get justice on behalf of her dead husband, who served his country honorably, here in these United States of America. Shameful.