| Easter Sunrise Greeted by Separationists
Separationists turn their backs on the cross to hear sunrise speakers. David C. Noelle Northwest of downtown San Diego, California, looms Mount Soledad — an expansive hill which rewards the climber with a panoramic view of the northern reaches of the city. To the north and west lie the beautiful beaches of La Jolla and the blue Pacific. To the south may be seen the glittering skyscrapers of the city, the waterways of San Diego Bay, and the huge arching bridge to Coronado. The eastern view reveals lush green canyons and mountains in the distance. Atop Mount Soledad is a public park, making this wondrous vista available to every citizen . . . every Christian citizen, anyway. In the middle of the park stands a huge, white, Latin cross, visible from the beaches and canyons below. The location of this cross has been a gathering place for Easter worship services for over 70 years. The cross itself was constructed and dedicated with Easter sunrise events in mind. Despite its clearly Christian nature and purpose, this monument has been supported on public land by city funds for decades. Several years ago, this clear violation of the First Amendment's establishment clause was challenged in the courts by two brave San Diego citizens. Howard Kreisner of the Atheist Coalition and Philip Paulson of the Humanist Association of San Diego both sued the city over the cross. With legal help from Dr. Peter Irons, a Constitutional lawyer who also teaches political science at the University of California, San Diego, the two plaintiffs managed to convince the court that the cross must be removed from public land. The city appealed this decision, and the appeals court reiterated the need to remove the cross. The Supreme Court refused to hear the city's subsequent appeal. Ignoring the court's order, the City of San Diego sold a tiny plot of land around the cross to a private organization, the Mount Soledad Memorial Association, for a ridiculously small sum. This blatant attempt to avoid the judgment of the court is currently being challenged, with the next hearing scheduled for early May. Last February, in the midst of this legal battle, Dr. Irons visited the local parks department to see if the Mount Soledad Memorial Association had acquired a permit to use the park this Easter. To his surprise, he discovered that no permit had been requested, and, indeed, such a permit had not been issued to the Memorial Association to conduct their Christian worship services for years. It was simply assumed by the city that the park would be reserved for these services. Seizing a rare opportunity, Dr. Irons immediately made application for use of the park on Easter morning. In the "organization" blank of the application, Dr. Irons listed the Atheist Coalition, despite the fact that he considers himself a practicing Christian. Several weeks later, the Atheist Coalition membership voted nearly unanimously to support Dr. Irons' Easter morning event. This support was offered even though many members of the Coalition had already made plans to attend the Atheist Alliance national convention in the Midwest on that weekend. Under the guidance of Dr. Irons and activist Craig Kelso, the theme for the Easter morning event became "The Park Belongs to Everyone." A program of speakers was assembled from San Diego's diverse religious and non- religious minority groups. The message went out that this secular celebration was to welcome all citizens, without concern for convictions or beliefs. This open invitation did not appeal to the local media, which chose instead to cast this gathering as a battle between atheists and Christians. The local newspapers contained frequent stories and editorials on the usurpation of this sacred ground by the childish and mean-spirited atheists. The San Diego Memorial Association refused to join in the celebration, opting to reserve the park for Memorial Day instead. One San Diego City Councilman, who also happens to be a Baptist preacher, reserved the park for the hour preceding the Atheist Coalition Easter event, but frontpage headlines soon thereafter declared that God himself had told this distinguished gentleman to withdraw his reservation. Many people climbed Mount Soledad on the morning of April 7th. With sleep still in their eyes from the reinstantiation of daylight savings time, people were forced by limited parking space to climb to the top of the hill on foot. Arriving in darkness, members of the "The Park Belongs to Everyone" committee quietly set up for their event while television cameras captured the wild circus of street preachers and angry Christian banner wavers which pranced about the cross. As the sun crept above the mountains, the celebration of freedom and diversity began. Dr. Irons and Craig Kelso welcomed the crowd, which numbered between 200 and 300. The sound of their voices over the P.A. system was heard by the demonstrators at the nearby cross, and a parade of banner toting crusaders marched towards the podium. The motley crew of anti-separationists included several bible thumpers shouting hallelujahs, a mock Jesus bearing a large wooden cross and receiving flogging by a woman wearing bunny- rabbit make-up, and a collection of young muscular men wearing clothing reminiscent of inner-city street gangs, chanting "It's the blood that sets me free." The disruption was significant, but the separationists went on. Scott Nailor, speaking on behalf of the Atheist Coalition, shouted out his niece, ignoring the drone of the protesters behind him. Television cameras ignored his words and focused instead on any interaction that showed promise of escalating into violence. Brave freethinkers and other separationists stepped forward to quietly interpose their bodies between the protesters and the speakers. Then, as if out of nowhere, several uniformed officers of the San Diego Police Department appeared and calmly enforced the park permit granted to Dr. Irons. The Christian protesters were directed to keep their distance, and their shouts and chants slowly died down to an occasional heckling. JoAnne Harrison, speaking for the local wiccans, related the pagan history of Easter. She was followed by the Reverend Tom Owen-Towle of the First Unitarian Universalist Church. A musical interlude was then provided by Vincent Clarke, an amiable elderly trombonist who had played in years past for the Christian services held on Mount Soledad. On this occasion, Mr. Clarke entertained the crowd with a selection of secular show tunes. The crowd joined in, clapping and singing along. After the music, Alan Mandelberg of the Humanist Fellowship of San Diego approached the podium and called attention to the trend towards secularization in our world, praising the democratic principles which allowed diversity of opinion to thrive. Speaking for the San Diego Association of Secular Humanists, David Noelle answered some of the anti-separationist attacks which had appeared in the press. The Reverend Dr. Dusty Pruitt, pastor of the Metropolitan Community Church (a Christian church appealing to the gay and lesbian population of San Diego), spoke next. She reviled the Christian protesters, offering a view of Christianity consistent with First Amendment concerns. Finally, Dr. Peter Irons addressed the crowd. He reviewed the history of the recent cross litigation and called upon the city government to recognize the diversity of its constituency. He bemoaned the way in which the media had focused on and hoped for confrontation and conflict at this event, and he rejoiced in how peaceful and civil this diverse Easter morning gathering had been. He extended warm words of gratitude to the supportive crowd and also to the Christian protesters who had actually stayed to hear all of the speakers. After taking in a final scan of the breath-taking view, the crowd descended. There was no way to predict how the press would report this event, or how the courts would respond to it. Still, one thing was sure. The religious and non-religious minorities of San Diego had stood together and insisted that their city grant them — all of them — their full rights under the law.
On Being Civil!David C. Noelle I'd like to begin by thanking Dr. Irons and the membership of the Atheist Coalition for sponsoring this event. By organizing this gathering, these people, and those of us who have supported their efforts, have become the target of many insults and much ill will. We have been called childish, mean-spirited, and uncivil. Now, I tend to consider myself fairly mature, friendly, and courteous, so these angry words caught me a bit off-guard. I asked myself, "Is this event truly a breach of civility?" To be honest with you, I originally answered this question with a "yes". It didn't seem very polite for us to gather here this morning. After all, we had good reason to suspect that our celebration would interfere with the plans of others who hoped to worship here. As far as I know, there were no courteous offers to negotiate a compromise. My Christian neighbors asked, "Why can't the atheists hold their celebration on another morning or at another location? Why are they making trouble?" I had no answers for them. But then I thought of Rosa Parks. On the 1st of December in 1955, Rosa did something that, frankly, wasn't very polite. Seated on a bus in Montgomery, Alabama, she refused to relinquish her seat to a white man. She was arrested for violating the city's segregated seating laws. If they had lived in Montgomery at the time, I suspect that my neighbors would have accused Rosa of being childish, mean spirited, and uncivil. They would ask, "Why couldn't she just move to a seat at the back of the bus? Why is she making trouble?" For Rosa, the answer was clear. She was living in a city that, through its actions, identified her as a second-class citizen, all because of the color of her skin. Rosa wasn't very polite that day in December, but her action embodied the height of civility. As an American citizen, she stood up to the prejudices of a city to protect the civil rights of all of us. After thinking of Rosa Parks, I no longer saw our gathering as uncivil. Like Rosa, we are living in a city that, through its actions, has identified many of us as second-class citizens, all because of our particular religious beliefs or the lack thereof. The Christian monument on this hill, which our city government has supported both in maintenance and court costs, is a clear sign that the non-Christians in San Diego should not always expect fair and equal treatment by their city. This large cross in a public park, still standing despite court orders for its removal, is a clear message that, in the eyes of the City of San Diego, Christians are preferred and others are to be, at best, merely tolerated. In the face of this insult, we cannot be quietly courteous. As members of a civil society, we must stand up to the prejudices of our city in the name of freedom of conscience and freedom of opinion. I am a Secular Humanist, and, as such, I live a joyous and ethical life, free of belief in dogma or supernatural forces. My convictions differ from those of my religious neighbors, but I am not asking the city to adopt my views on life in preference to theirs. I am only asking that the city government recognize the diversity of belief and non- belief in this fine town, and offer equal respect to us all by adopting no religious preferences at all. I am only asking the city to be civil to all of its citizens. I am no orator, so I will close with the words of an orator. In the words of Robert Green Ingersoll:
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