Story Archive

Who is this “We” You Refer To?

After years of seeing a menorah and a life-sized nativity scene in a public park in Boca Raton, Fla., Preston Smith decided to put up a somewhat different religious symbol: a 300-pound, 10-foot pentagram to serve as “a sacred memorial for the countless freethinking heretics, heroic heathens and brave blasphemers brutally burned alive at the stake in city squares by righteous believers not long ago,” he says. Smith, a Palm Beach County schoolteacher, even got a permit from the city to add the monument in the park’s so-called “Free Expression Zone,” and the city also allowed a counter-protest banner by religious groups saying “We find it a shameful and hypocritical way to advocate for freedom from religion.” Still, police responded to reports of vandalism of the monument eight times, until someone drove into the park to push it down; as other drivers went by afterward, they honked and cheered the damage. A man who lives nearby says the destruction bothers him more than the monument. “As a Marine, I served to protect our freedoms,” says Tom Beal, 44. “I served to protect the freedom of religion and freedom of speech. I am not in opposition to things I don’t agree with or understand.” (RC/South Florida Sun-Sentinel) ...“Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” —Luke 6:31.