I’m an atheist and a Darwinist. I don’t go to church except to attend weddings and the odd Christmas or Easter service. I’m what you might call “secular.” The difference between other secularists and me is that I respect my Christian heritage. I don’t take offense at the display of traditional Christian symbols in the public domain — Christianity is, after all, part of America’s cultural endowment — and I would never, never presume to be offended by the display of a Christian symbol, like a cross, in a Christian setting, like a chapel.
But some people feel differently. The College of William & Mary has now taken to removing the cross from the alter in the Wren Chapel during the building’s use for non-religious events. As reported by the Cavalier Daily:
William & Mary President Gene Nichol released a statement to the college community saying that he has “not banished the cross from the Wren Chapel. The Chapel … is used for religious ceremonies by members of all faiths. The cross will remain in the Chapel and be displayed on the altar at appropriate religious services.”
However, Nichol continued that “the Chapel is also used frequently for College events that are secular in nature — and should be open to students and staff of all beliefs” and “must be welcoming to all.”
This is rich: A Christian chapel can be “welcoming” only by denying the central symbol of the Christian religion. Even some Muslims, it appears, have more respect for Christian symbols than does William & Mary’s secular administration. The Cavalier Daily quoted Ilgaz Toros, a second-year engineering student at the University of Virginia and a practicing Muslim: “The fact that it is a religious place shouldn’t be denied.”
(Photo credit: William & Mary.)
Update: Brian Ledbetter, a “lifelong Virginian and current resident of the northern parts of the Commonwealth, er, make that ‘Lower’ New York,” posted on this story before I did — and adds a few choice observations of his own. Read his post at “Snapped Shot.”
Update: Good editorial in the Virginian-Pilot. Those fellows make sense when they’re not writing about transportation!
