Group Calls For Removal Of 10 Commandments From Public Park

WGAL ^ | WGAL

[anonymous_user]

Group Calls For Removal Of 10 Commandments From Public Park

Local Churches, Groups Offer Home For Monument

POSTED: 6:37 PM EST February 2, 2004
UPDATED: 11:59 PM EST February 2, 2004

HANOVER, Pa. -- It has been 50 years since a Ten Commandments monument was placed in Wirt Park in Hanover, York County.

Do you think it is all right for a religious monument to be displayed in a public park? Do you think it is all right for a religious monument to be displayed in a public park? Yes No Only if other religions are equally represented Now, Hanover residents are fighting to keep it there.

"We donated it and it ain't hurting nobody. I don't think it should be moved after all these years," said Wesley Eyler, with the Fraternal Order of Eagles.

Ed Weinstock's Report

Eyler speaks for many in Hanover who want the Ten Commandments monument to remain in the Hanover park, but the borough may have no choice but to move it after the threat of a lawsuit by the group Americans United For Separation of Church and State.

That is upsetting for Eyler and members of his organization, the Fraternal Order of Eagles. Fifty years ago, they donated the monument to the Hanover community.

"I don't see how it can offend anyone, really," Eyler said.

The FOE has offered to move the monument to their property in nearby Penn Township. In fact, more than a dozen churches and private groups have made similar gestures to move the monument to private property.

Marty Kiggins is the associate pastor at First United Methodist Church. He can picture the Ten Commandments monument in the church's front yard. He said the church is willing to help pay to move it.

"Matter of fact, we feel it is better here than at Wirt Park," Kiggins said.

The Hanover Borough Council may decide at its next meeting the future of the monument, and clearly, the cost of a legal battle over moving the monument will be a big factor.

Council member Gary Brown said borough officials are still considering their options. He said the monument is a part of the community's history and he doesn't want to change that. For now, he said the monument is staying right where it is.

"We are not going to move it until we know for sure we cannot afford to fight this," Brown said.

If the Ten Commandments monument has to be moved, it won't be until spring when the ground thaws.

[ladyinred]

Sure why not? Maybe they could replace it with quotes from the Satanic Bible and just be done with it! </sarcasm

[AppyPappy]

Too Jewish?

[Hodar]

Oh, sure; if we allow the 10 Commandments in the public parks, we have to then recognize other religons as well. Then we would have to have.... oh, say Pacific NW Indian Totem poles out on public land ..... ah, wait a minute ... we already do.

[anonymous_user]

I say they're welcome to move the monument for $1 million which should cover the cost of removing the original and the cost of replacing it with a statue of "equal" value.

That will happen when hell freezes over.

[Bikers4Bush]

More busybody losers.

[anoldafvet]

"We are not going to move it until we know for sure we cannot afford to fight this," Brown said.

That's exactly how the anti-religion forces keep winning, they make it too expensive for towns or cities to defend.

[JustPlainJoe]

Exactly! This sounds like a bunch of anti-semitics who just want to stamp out the Jewish race - and their "propoganda".

Where are the folks who are beating up Mel Gibson?

[Robert A Cook PE]

Gee.

Why don't they call the monument "art" and DEMAND that the hysterical liberals "live with it" and "tolerate diversity" ....

After all, WE were FORCED to "tolerate diversity" when OUR ACTUAL religious symbols were dunked in urine, smeared with elephant dung, and shown defecating .....

Here, a beautiful monument is protested in the name of "religion"... When a person who DIDN'T pay complains.

But when a monstrosity and an abomination is "called" art, and PAID for by the taxpayers in a tax-free museum and exhibits by the NEA, that dung, that urine must be tolerated.

[Blzbba]

"After all, WE were FORCED to "tolerate diversity" when OUR ACTUAL religious symbols were dunked in urine, smeared with elephant dung, and shown defecating ....."


'tolerate diversity'? Hell, thru the endowments granted by the insidious NEA, we were forced to SUBSIDIZE that garbage!

[anonymous_user]

Why don't they call the monument "art" and DEMAND that the hysterical liberals "live with it" and "tolerate diversity" ....

Wow, you nailed it there. Consider that arguement borrowed!

[tuckrdout]

"Should I keep back my opinions at such a time, through fear of giving offense, I should consider myself as guilty of treason towards my country, and of an act of disloyalty toward the Majesty of Heaven, which I revere above all earthly kings..."

"They tell us, sir, that we are weak; unable to cope with so formidable an adversary. But when shall we be stronger? Will it be the next week, or the next year? Will it be when we are totally disarmed," ......... "Shall we gather strength by irresolution and inaction? Shall we acquire the means of effectual resistance by lying supinely on our backs and hugging the delusive phantom of hope, until our enemies shall have bound us hand and foot? Sir, we are not weak if we make a proper use of those means which the God of nature hath placed in our power. The millions of people, armed in the holy cause of liberty, and in such a country as that which we possess, are invincible by any force which our enemy can send against us. Besides, sir, we shall not fight our battles alone. There is a just God who presides over the destinies of nations, and who will raise up friends to fight our battles for us. The battle, sir, is not to the strong alone; it is to the vigilant, the active, the brave. Besides, sir, we have no election. If we were base enough to desire it, it is now too late to retire from the contest. There is no retreat but in submission and slavery! Our chains are forged! Their clanking may be heard on the plains of Boston! The war is inevitable--and let it come! I repeat it, sir, let it come."

"It is in vain, sir, to extenuate the matter. Gentlemen may cry, Peace, Peace-- but there is no peace. The war is actually begun!"

"It cannot be emphasized too strongly or too often that this great Nation was founded not by religionists, but by Christians; not on religions, but on the Gospel of Jesus Christ. For that reason alone, people of other faiths have been afforded freedom of worship here."---Patrick Henry...one of those important founders.

[RightWhale]

call the monument "art" and DEMAND that the hysterical liberals "live with it" and "tolerate diversity" ....

Of course it is art. Who ever thought otherwise? Pluralism works both ways.

[StonyBurk]

There is nothing in the clear language used in the First
Amendment--Nothing reported of the Debates on the First
Amendment-- to support moving this monument. There is only the "fraud perpetrated" by the godless Anti-American ACLU--and that Ku Klux Klansman Hugo Black back in 1947.Before
any debate this removal they ought be compelled to visit the
State S.Ct. in Harriburg Pa. for if the monument that has stood for fifty years is an offence then surely the State
S.Ct. bldg is a greater offence for its' public displays.

[TheDon]

So much for tolerance.

[gathersnomoss]

Or maybe a condom machine can be placed in it's spot.

[tuckrdout]

So right! This is freedom of speech through art!

'"We have staked the whole future of our new nation not upon the power of government; far from it. We have staked the future of all our political constitutions upon the capacity of each of ourselves to govern ourselves according to the moral principles of the Ten Commandments."--James Madison, author of the constitution. So, one could rightly assume that he would never think that the Ten Commandments were 'unconstitutional'

I believe that the courts in this country are UNCONSTITUTIONAL! We have allowed them more power than the other branches of government. It must be stopped.

Abraham Lincoln said:

...if the policy of the government upon vital questions affecting the whole people, is to be irrevocable fixed by decisions of the Supreme Court, the instant they are made in ordinary litigation between parties in personal actions, the people will have ceased to be their own rulers, having to that extent practically resigned their government into the hands of that eminent tribunal.

[Puppage]

Do you think it is all right for a religious monument to be displayed in a public park?

The 10 Commandments are not religeous....they're more a spritual way of living.

[microgood]

If you did a protest march where you made likenesses of Federal Judges with their black robes and committed violence against the likenesses and eventually burned them right in front of a federal court, would that be free speech?

[Puppage]

Or, better yet, why don't we just call the the 10 Suggestions, or the 10 Good Ideas

Would they like it more then?