The battle over a large iconic cross in the South Bay has come to an end.
After standing in Santa Clara for more than six decades, the 14-foot cross was taken down — by a lawsuit.
A Santa Clara man and Wisconsin-based Freedom from Religion Foundation sued the city last April, claiming the cross violated the separation of church and state because it stood in a public park.
“We are happy that the city divested itself of this religious symbol, and that the constitution is now being complied with,” said Rebecca Markert, attorney for Freedom From Religion Foundation.
The granite cross was donated by the Santa Clara Lion’s Club in 1953 to mark the site of the second Spanish Catholic mission established in the city in 1777.
City councilmembers settled with the man who filed the suit, and said a compromise was necessary.
“Some people feel like we’ve caved in or succumbed to the arguments of a relatively small number of people, but as I said, they do have a number of legal precedents on their side,” councilmember Teresa O’Neill said.
As part of the settlement, the city donated the cross to Santa Clara University, where it will be placed on campus in the future.
Story from NBC Los Angeles.
What are they going to remove next, the name of the City of Santa Clara. After all its name has the word Saint in its title. The site of this Cross is where a Spanish Catholic mission used to be on. If America continues to allow a few misguided people to remove all semblance of what used to be a Christian nation to remove its Christian Catholic symbols it won’t be too long before America experiences the wrath and judgement of a very just God. This move to remove the Cross is a slap in the face to Jesus Christ who is the Son of God True God and True Man Lord of Lords and King of Kings for giving his life on the Cross for the forgiveness of sins and salvation of all man kind no matter what their faith is or was. Pray America Pray for…
I agree. They tried this nonsense in the City of Santa Monica in the 1990s. The Christians demanded that if they took down the statue of St. Monica they’d have to change the name of the City as well. They suggested “Monicaville”. With the Clinton scandal fresh in everyone’s minds the fact hit the atheoids that their beloved city would no longer be an attraction for tourists. The statue of St. Monica remains.
Mike Pence will take the oath with hand on 2 Chronicles 7:14:
“If My people, who are called by My name, will humble themselves and pray, and seek My face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and will heal their land.”
Taking down the cross is wicked.
I have a newspaper clipping from the old San Jose Mercury from the year 1936, with a photo of my father, several other “Santa Clara College” (then its name) freshmen and a Jesuit professor from “SCU”, doing volunteer gardening and cleanup on this park, which was then in an agricultural area on De La Cruz Blvd. Of course, this stone cross wasn’t there, but a wooden cross, that was later moved to the front of the Santa Clara Mission where it now stands.
Santa Clara college every year used to maintain the park, since it is the site of the 3rd mission foundation from 1784 to 1819, when it was moved to its present site at the center of the SCU campus (the mission had to be moved successively due to annual spring flooding by the…
Guadalupe River—just as is happening now, although the river now has 40-foot high levees to control its flood plain. The City of Santa Clara had maintained the park from the 1950’s on, as a cultural heritage site. Of course, Wisconsin and local atheists, happy people that they are, don’t care about that.
By the way, the reason for the cross is that the park is the site of the camposanto, the Ohlone Indian burial ground for Christian Indians from 1784 to 1819 (they were buried next to the now-long-gone primitive mission church of that period). Most people don’t know that.
Were I an atheist or were I not, I would be wary of disturbing the resting place of the departed, be they the faithful departed or otherwise. They…
await the resurrection of the dead, not the Wisconsin and local atheist’s societies’ pleasure. Blessed the dead who die in the Lord! (Rev. 14:13).
Correction: the 2nd site pictured above (from whence the granite cross was removed) was the site of the 2nd mission church from 1779-1784. The 3rd site is near the current entrance to the University off the recently re-routed Alameda/El Camino Real.
“If there were not God, there would be no atheists.” (G.K. Chesterton)
If your faith hinges on whether your local public park has a cross on it, then your faith is more shallow than the ground on which it stood. Plant your faith deep inside your heart, like a seed on fertile soil. So that no bird, no court, no infidel can take that seed of faith away.
There is a large cross on Mt. Soledad in La Jolla [San Diego]. Despite decades of litigation seeking removal, the cross still stands. While proponents of removal may have much law supporting them, there is at least one point supporting keeping the cross, so far successfully. Same state, same Federal apellate circuit. Curious as to why exact opposite results.
YFC, why do you think its a good idea to extinguish any public display of the Cross.
Oh, don’t try, Bohemond, the Fellow Catholic always singularly misses the point and wishes to share his own confusion.
However, most people don’t know this was and is a cemetery site—there were and still are, many pre-statehood cemeteries like this around the San Jose-Santa Clara original city boundaries–and that was why in the past it was taken over by the City of Santa Clara. That is also why the cross has stood there: there are Christian Indian burials on the premises (even though, right in back of it, is the San Jose Mineta International Airport grounds and cyclone fence!).
But the main purpose here presently is of course to erase the Catholic heritage by the many bitterly inspired atheist types here in the SF…
..Baytheist Area (i.e., Andrew Defaria, likely a bitter ex-Catholic, and the Wisconsin Atheist coven).
I never said that bohemond.
You clearly don’t have the courage to oppose the removal but you launch into platitudes, are ashamed of the public display of the Holy Cross. or just maybe you are the one whose insecure about his Faith.
I favor the removal of crosses from government owned properties. Private properties can display whatever religious symbols they wish. I’m hardly “ashamed of the public display of the Holy Cross”, I just think the law of the land ought to be followed.
YFC why do you not come out and oppose its removal..????
” He that denies me before man I shall deny before the Father” .You are not Catholic YFC you can go on pretending but you are not…..