Wrongheaded Lawsuit by Americans United for Separation of Church and State Challenges Federal Funding of California Missions.
Americans United for Separation of Church and State, in their ongoing effort to ensure a tortured reading of the U.S. Constitution's establishment clause, is challenging the California Missions Preservation Act, a federal law which provides $10 million to restore the historic and beloved remnants of California's past. The California Missions Foundation explains why the lawsuit is wrong: Response to the Lawsuit Filed by Americans United for Separation of Church and State. The missions were founded in the 18th century by Spanish friars. A statue of the founder of the state's mission system, Junipero Serra, who has been beatified, stands in the Capitol rontunda in Washington, D.C., along with other prominent historic figures, two from each state.
The missions, after Disneyland, are the second greatest tourist attraction in the state. Study of their history is required as part of the 4th grade curriculum and most fourth graders visit a mission and build a model of one as part of their study. Although all but a few of the twenty some missions now have Catholic churches where Mass is celebrated, a huge part of their function is nonreligious, to service the historic and cultural interests of students and tourists.
Strangely, the Rev. Barry Lynn, executive director of AUSCS, who apparently never tires of being wrong, is quoted in the Orange County Catholic, a diocesan paper, as admitting that the funding serves a public purpose. Not surprisingly, the bill, which according to Lynn violates the establishment clause, was sponsored by non-Catholics, Democrat Barbara Boxer in the Senate and Rep. Sam Farr, D-Carmel, in the House.
This recent brouhaha follows on the tail of the L.A. County Board of Supervisors folding under pressure from other radical secularists and removing the small cross from the L.A. County seal. Ironically, the cross was replaced by a mission (albeit a mission conspicuously devoid of a cross).
The astute Dennis Prager, a nationally syndicated talk show host and author, who happens to be Jewish and is almost as consistently right as Barry Lynn is wrong, opposed the removal of the cross from the L.A. County seal, noting that those who seek its removal are like the Taliban. Where the Taliban sought to destroy Afghanistan's Buddhist heritage, radical securarists in California seek to destroy its Catholic heritage.
The missions, after Disneyland, are the second greatest tourist attraction in the state. Study of their history is required as part of the 4th grade curriculum and most fourth graders visit a mission and build a model of one as part of their study. Although all but a few of the twenty some missions now have Catholic churches where Mass is celebrated, a huge part of their function is nonreligious, to service the historic and cultural interests of students and tourists.
Strangely, the Rev. Barry Lynn, executive director of AUSCS, who apparently never tires of being wrong, is quoted in the Orange County Catholic, a diocesan paper, as admitting that the funding serves a public purpose. Not surprisingly, the bill, which according to Lynn violates the establishment clause, was sponsored by non-Catholics, Democrat Barbara Boxer in the Senate and Rep. Sam Farr, D-Carmel, in the House.
This recent brouhaha follows on the tail of the L.A. County Board of Supervisors folding under pressure from other radical secularists and removing the small cross from the L.A. County seal. Ironically, the cross was replaced by a mission (albeit a mission conspicuously devoid of a cross).
The astute Dennis Prager, a nationally syndicated talk show host and author, who happens to be Jewish and is almost as consistently right as Barry Lynn is wrong, opposed the removal of the cross from the L.A. County seal, noting that those who seek its removal are like the Taliban. Where the Taliban sought to destroy Afghanistan's Buddhist heritage, radical securarists in California seek to destroy its Catholic heritage.
posted by BarbariansAtBay at
5:39 PM
