The Tree of Denigration

by JOTUS
December 2, 2009

If you’ve been to downtown West Chester recently and have driven past the old courthouse building you probably noticed several festive displays on the courthouse lawn.  There’s the traditional Christmas tree provided by the Chester County Chamber of Commerce, there’s the Menorah display representing the Jewish faith’s tradition of Hanukkah, and there is the crèche representing one of the most celebrated Christian holidays of the year—Christmas.  Both Christmas and Hanukkah are religious traditions celebrated in the month of December; Hanukkah, also known as The Festival of Lights, is an eight-day Jewish holiday observing the rededication of the Second Temple in Jerusalem while Christmas is the day that Christians celebrate the birth of Christ and rejoice in the coming of the one true Messiah.

But you’ll also see a gaudy, out-of-place, and inappropriate fourth monstrosity of a display tarnishing the courthouse lawn for the third year in a row.  It’s called the Tree of Knowledge, a grotesque and kitschy shrine to Godlessness sponsored by the Freethought Society of Greater Philadelphia.  And despite numerous complaints by various citizens and groups in Chester County, county commissioners Terence Farrell, Carol Aichele, and Kathi Cozzone have not only allowed this assemblage of non-theists to display their tree, but they’ve permitted it to be mockingly postured  just a few feet from the nativity scene yet again this year.   Perhaps the commissioners’ political correctness is motivated by fear of bad publicity and/or litigation, but common sense would dictate that December holiday displays have a direct tie-in to a December holiday tradition; those that don’t shouldn’t be displayed in December.

The reason for the Christian and Jewish holiday displays is obvious, both commemorate sacred religious celebrations.  But what’s the reason for the Freethought Society’s atheist eyesore?  Colin Hanna, Founder of Let Freedom Ring and former Chester County Commissioner summates their motives quite nicely, “It’s an agenda of hate and denigration, not a reverential celebration of any religious tradition.  The Freethought Society is about attacking respectful Judeo-Christian traditions and nothing else.”  Hanna sponsors the crèche each year on behalf of the Pennsylvania Pastors Network—a project of Let Freedom Ring, a nonpartisan public policy membership organization promoting Constitutional government, economic freedom, and traditional family values.

Indeed, the Freethought Society and their founder Margaret Downey are agents of the Enemy in every regard and their garish tree replete with “ornaments” in the shape of laminated book covers by prominent atheists is in poor taste.  Of the hundreds of book titles hanging on the tree some include A Devil’s Chaplain and The God Delusion by avowed doubter Richard Dawkins, Misquoting Jesus by Bart Ehrman, and The End of Faith by Sam Harris.

So where the Christian and Jewish faith tradition displays seek to revere and honor, the Freethought Society’s monument to religious nihilism seeks to asperse and malign as evidenced in the book titles on their tree.  There’s really no ostensible connection between the Tree of Knowledge and any December holidays except the winter solstice, but Downey plainly stated in a 2008 interview in a local paper that there was “absolutely no connection” between the atheist tree and any pagan holiday.  So why the December display?  Why not put up their tree in January, or any other month of the year?  Because the Freethought Society’s chief purpose is to detract from the Judeo-Christian faith traditions that Americans have enjoyed and celebrated for centuries.

Furthermore, there are three very prominent white signs on the tree advertising the Freethought Society’s website—something specifically prohibited in the display provisions and also something you won’t see on the Menorah or the crèche.  Tacky is an understatement.  Imagine advertisements on a public Christmas tree, Menorah, or nativity scene? And the bigger question is why are the county commissioners allowing a special interest group this kind of blatant self-promotion?

Chester Countians are quite familiar with Ms. Downey’s brand of anti-God venom too.  In October of 2001 Downey and her cabal of deity denying free-thoughters filed suit against the Chester County commissioners to have the Ten Commandments plaque removed from the courthouse portico.  After a protracted legal battle, the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals appropriately ruled that the plaque could remain at the courthouse and Downey and the ACLU conceded in April of 2003.  In the early 1990’s Downey filed an unsuccessful lawsuit against Boy Scouts of America--a private organization free to set their own stipulations for membership--for denying her atheist son membership, and in 2007 her Freethought Society, with help from the ACLU, also pressured Coatesville City Council to eliminate prayer during its public meetings.

It was esteemed orator, author, and abolitionist Frederick Douglass who said, “Find out just what any people will quietly submit to and you have the exact measure of the injustice and wrong which will be imposed on them.”  Unless God-fearing Chester Countians voice their displeasure to the county commissioners at this offensive group’s deprecation of American faith traditions, the Freethought Society and their ilk will continue to impose their harmful rhetoric and chip away at the very bedrock of American exceptionalism:  God.  It’s time for a little righteous indignation in His name.