Claim: The American Atheists organization opposes incorporating a steel-beam cross found in the World Trade Center rubble into a permanent memorial to the victims who died there on September 11.
Example:[Collected on the Internet, 2003]
Dear Conservative Friend,
This is one e-mail that you NEED to forward to ALL of your contacts, across the country and around the world. We MUST NOT let the travesty below take place.
According to a recent article, with the upcoming 2-year anniversary of the deadly 9/11 attacks, "an atheist organization is once again warning against using a steel-beam cross at the site of the World Trade Center
disaster from being used in a permanent memorial to the victims who died there."
The organization American Atheists (founded by the late Madalyn Murray O'Hair) is protesting a proposal to use a large steel cross found in the rubble of the World Trade Center in a memorial to victims of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
We all remember that cross. A construction worker came across it in the midst of the WTC wreckage just a few days after the attacks. It was standing straight, 20-feet high, surrounded by many smaller crosses. After
it was discovered, construction workers, firefighters, police officers and family members began holding weekly Sunday services at the site.
The names of fallen police officers and firefighters were also scribbled on the cross, along with the message "God Bless Our Fallen Brothers".
And now, this group of atheists is threatening a lawsuit to prevent the cross from becoming part of any permanent memorial.
You and I can help to stop their assault by signing ConservativeAlerts.com's online petition.
ACTION ITEM: The Lower Manhattan Development Corporation, the agency overseeing the rebuilding of the area, has made no decisions on what a Ground Zero memorial would include. There's still time for hundreds of thousands of people to voice their opinion, that the "Ground Zero Cross" should remain as part of any future memorial to the WTC victims.
Go to our site below to sign the "Ground Zero Cross" petition NOW:
NOTE: In order to have an impact on the folks at the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation, we need HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS of signers, from across America and all over the world, on this petition, which we will present to the agency. Be sure to forward this e-mail to everyone you know who wants to help STOP the atheists from blocking this powerful symbol of healing after disaster. Thank you!
Origins: The discovery of a 20-foot steel-beam cross in the rubble of the World Trade Center towers two days after the 2001 terrorist attacks on America provided a tangible symbol of comfort and faith to many of those horrified by the events of September 11. Some of those who had access to the WTC site at that time made pilgrimages to pray before the cross and
leave behind written messages such as "God Bless Our Fallen Brothers." A few weeks later the cross was hoisted atop a 40-foot-high mound of debris on what was formerly a pedestrian walkway so that it could be viewed by a wider audience, and a religious service was held, during which the Rev. Brian Jordan sprinkled the cross with holy water and declared: "Behold the glory of the cross at ground zero. This is our symbol of hope, our symbol of faith, our symbol of healing." Countless other ceremonies and prayer vigils were held at the site of WTC cross in the weeks and months that followed. Two years later, the cross remains in place along Church Street on the eastern border of the 16-acre WTC site.
Ever since the unearthing of the steel-beam cross from the WTC rubble, a number of groups have supported the idea of incorporating the steel cross into the design of a future September 11 memorial display at the site. The American Atheists organization has long opposed such plans for two major reasons:
They feel that since the memorial is to be financed with public funds, it is inappropriate for the memorial to include a sectarian religious symbol.
They feel that the inclusion of a specifically Christian symbol would be an insult to the victims, rescue workers, and others connected to the WTC tragedy who follow a non-Christian religion or are not religious.
The president of the American Atheists organization, Ellen Johnson, expressed this viewpoint at least as far back as June 2002:
Efforts to make the steel cross part of a permanent display at the site in Lower Manhattan come as officials mull a suitable way to re-develop the former World Trade Center location. A final blueprint for the area is to be chosen by December 1, and will include a memorial of some kind to the 2,823 people killed during the attack on the twin towers.
The redevelopment group has already received more than $2 billion in public funds to construct new buildings on and around the former WTC site.
"None of this money should be used to construct any religious memorial," said Ellen Johnson, President of American Atheists. "This is a public area, and it's being rebuilt with public funds. Tax money must not be used to construct any sectarian memorial."
Johnson added that calls to include the cross as part of a permanent memorial "insult the victims, rescue workers and other Americans who are not Christians, who do not believe in a deity and are not religious."
Ms. Johnson reiterated American Atheists' position in the 8 September 2003 edition of The Trentonian:
Many people who died on September 11 weren't Christian. There were Jews, Muslims, and atheists who died. This is a Christian religious advertisement, and allowing it to stay there is an insult to everyone who doesn't believe in that particular religion.
Recent news accounts have stated that the American Atheists group, founded by the late Madelyn Murray O'Hair, is considering a lawsuit to prevent the beam from becoming part of any permanent memorial to the September 11 terrorist attacks.
Much of this issue is still tentative, however. The Lower Manhattan Development Corporation (LMDC), the group overseeing the rebuilding of the WTC area, has not yet made any firm decisions on what a proposed memorial at that site would include. We can't say how effective a petition like the one quoted above would be in convincing the LMDC to include the cross as part of the proposed memorial, or whether American Atheists would actually file suit to stop the cross from becoming part of the memorial should the LMDC opt to include it.
Last updated: 6 September 2007
The URL for this page is http://www.snopes.com/politics/religion/wtccross.asp
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