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Photo credit: Staten Island Advance/Ryan Lavis
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Jay Sekulow, Chief Counsel for
the American Center for Law and Justice, proudly announced that
the Second Circuit Court of Appeals rejected the American Atheists’ challenge
to including the famed “Ground Zero Cross” in the National September 11 Museum.
The rusted, twisted metal beams
were pulled from the rubble of the 9/11 attacks just feet from where Rev.
Mychal F. Judge, chaplain of the NYFD, died while helping victims on that
horrible day.
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Photo credit: Associated Press
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Rev. Brian Jordan, a friend and
fellow Franciscan of Mychal, saved the cross. Each weekend, Jordan said Mass at
the foot of the cross. His congregation was a mixture of victims' families,
workers and visitors that grew from dozens to hundreds. There were people of
all religions and none. What seemed to
matter most was the gathering together.
The only work of art commissioned
for the National 9/11 Museum is a wall made up of 2,983 individual squares of
Fabriano Italian paper—one square for every person killed in the Sept. 11
attacks and in the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center—each hand-painted a
different shade of blue to capture the brilliant, clear blue sky on the morning
of the attack.
Nestled in the center of the
artwork is the Virgilian quote, “No day shall erase you from the memory of
time.”
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Photo credit: Reuters
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The appellate court stated in a unanimous decision that the cross is historic as much
as it is religious and it is safe once more:
“As a matter of law, the record compels the conclusion that appellees’
actual purpose in displaying The Cross at Ground Zero has always been secular:
to recount the history of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, and
their aftermath.” —Circuit Judge Reena Raggi
“Thus, the Establishment Clause is not properly construed to
command that government accounts of history be devoid of religious
references. Nor is a permissible secular purpose transformed into
an impermissible religious one because the government makes an historical
point with an artifact whose historical significance derives, in whole or
in part, from its religious symbolism.” —General Court Ruling
Documentation
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