Or Jesus on a Piece of Toast

In Defense of the Faith

By Jack Kinsella

The World Trade Center Cross, also known as the Ground Zero Cross, is a group of steel beams found amidst the debris of the World Trade Center following the September 11 terrorist attacks.

The crossed beams are in the exact proportions to form the shape of a typical Christian cross. For many American Christians, the twisted pieces of metal became a symbol of hope and comfort.

But it isn't a Christian cross in the sense that it was built, designed or assembled by any particular human being to symbolize any particular religion. It wasn't constructed on government land and neither was it paid for by government dollars.

The Ground Zero Cross is actually a piece of debris left over from the first enemy attack on the US mainland since the War of 1812. No government proclamation made these two pieces of metal a religious symbol.

It is what it is and NOBODY made it. (At least, nobody over Whom the US federal courts have any jurisdiction.) It is either the result of an act of Islamic terror, or it was created as an act of God. In either case, it is not the result of any human creative effort.

If one is a believer, then one is justified in concluding that God made it. But if one is an atheist, what conclusion should one reach?

A group called 'the American Atheists' concluded that it is a Christian cross, which, given the circumstances, evidently means they reached the exact same conclusion. God had to have made it.

Otherwise, it would just be a piece of debris from the World Trade Center.

American Atheists President David Silverman sued on the grounds that the World Trade Center Cross is an unconstitutional government endorsement of religion. But as we've already carefully noted, the alleged "religious icon" is a piece of debris from the World Trade Center.

It is only a cross if one chooses to interpret it that way and one can only interpret it that way if one believes it was deliberately constructed. Otherwise, it is a piece of debris.

The American Atheist position is that it is a Christian Cross, which is the absurd contention that because it is a cross, it must have been made by God, since it would otherwise be a random piece of debris.

However, they also argue that God is not allowed to exist under the Constitution, and so displaying it violates their rights as guaranteed them by, to quote the Declaration of Independence, "Nature's God."

The World Trade Center Memorial Museum wants to include the Cross as part of its museum exhibit.

For the record, I will call it 'a cross' because I firmly believe it is a Christian Cross fashioned by God Himself -- but I also believe that God exists, which would seem a prerequisite for seeing it as anything other than a piece of debris.

Otherwise, what the American Atheists are suing over is something that exists in someone else's mind. Unless I am missing something.

If I did not believe that God existed, then it could not possibly be a Christian Cross, since it is literally a piece of random debris.

For an unbeliever to argue that a piece of debris from the World Trade Center is actually a Christian Cross makes as much sense (for an unbeliever) as for him to argue that the scorch pattern on a piece of toast is actually the Image of Jesus.

If somebody else thinks that piece of toast is a sacred icon, does that mean that it is an actual picture of Jesus? If you see a picture of Jesus in a piece of toast, (but you don't believe in Jesus), then what you need is a psychiatric consultation, not a legal one.

The atheists are suing on the grounds that the mere existence of the Ground Zero Cross makes them physically sick, something they apparently believes violates their God-given rights under the Constitution.

"Nonsense, says a new friend-of-the-court brief to be filed Monday in the case by the American Center for Law and Justice. The brief, which carries the signatures of more than 100,000 people, argues there have been no known sightings of suicides or uncontrolled vomiting at or around the Ground Zero cross.

“The legal argument is absurd,” ACLJ Chief Counsel Jay Sekulow charged Wednesday. American Atheists, he said “is making some astonishing claims.”

The group contends the placement of the 17-foot-tall symbol at the National September 11 Memorial and Museum is making some atheists unbearably sick.

“The plaintiffs, and each of them, are suffering, and will continue to suffer damages, both physical and emotional, from the existence of the challenged cross,” the lawsuit American Atheists v. Port Authority of New York and New Jersey states. “Named plaintiffs have suffered …. dyspepsia, symptoms of depression, headaches, anxiety, and mental pain and anguish from the knowledge that they are made to feel officially excluded from the ranks of citizens who were directly injured by the 9/11 attack.”

Atheists claim that they are simply following the voice of reason and the reason that they would like everybody else to stop believing in God is because they find it personally offensive.

This idiotic claim that they feel officially excluded is a variation on the atheists' meme that because Christians believe that only Christians will go to heaven, Christianity is "hateful".

Atheists don't believe in God. They don't believe in Heaven. They believe that God is an imaginary friend and heaven is an imaginary place but they want to be allowed in or they will sue.

It is the equivalent absurdity of suing Peter, Paul and Mary because only Jackie Paper was allowed into the Land of Honnalee to visit Puff the Magic Dragon, but that is their main bone of contention, nonetheless.

The lawsuit demands that the undesigned piece of debris either be removed, or that some human being construct a seventeen foot tall "A" as a memorial to atheism, which is to say, a memorial to the belief in nothing.

The astonishing thing about this lawsuit is the fact that there is actually a judge somewhere in America that actually believes this lawsuit has enough merit to be heard.