National World War II Memorial May Soon Include a Plaque Honoring God
Source: The Friendly Atheist
May 21, 2014 By Hemant Mehta
The National World War II Memorial opened in Washington, D.C. in 2004 and it’s a wonderful tribute to those who risked and gave their lives for our country. ... But you know what it’s missing? ... God.
Two bills currently working their way through Congress — H.R. 2175, introduced by Rep. Bill Johnson (R-OH), and S. 1044, introduced by Sen. Rob Portman (R-OH) — aim to install a prayer plaque somewhere in the area of the monument with the words that President Franklin D. Roosevelt delivered on D-Day, a portion of which is below:
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The Center For Inquiry, Americans United for Separation of Church and State, and six other organizations have written letters to the Senate and House over the past year urging committee members to reconsider this idea:
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Yesterday, the Subcommittee on Public Lands and Environmental Regulations met to discuss H.R. 2175 and there was nary a discussion about the religious implications of the bill (starting at the 40:00 mark):
Read more: http://www.patheos.com/blogs/friendlyatheist/2014/05/21/national-world-war-ii-memorial-may-soon-include-a-plaque-honoring-god/
An earlier thread at DU quotes the New Republic:
Take the World War II Memorial—Please!
If architecture is, as Goethe put it, frozen music, then which classical opus is suspended within the granite semicircle of Washington’s National World War II memorial? To me, its bronze eagles, fountain sprays, and triumphal arches perfectly evoke "The Ride of the Valkyries." Not the original piece, made famous in Wagner’s eponymous opera, but the bizarro version screaming over Colonel Kilgore’s loudspeakers in Apocalypse Now: a death-from-above party jam meant to pump up our boys and send Charlie running for the hills. The structure is a pillared crown roast of Riefenstahlian bombast, derided by critics and unnecessarily cluttering space at the foot of the Washington Monument since its 2004 dedication. Perversely, considering its purpose, it is one of the most forgettable tourist stops on the Mall.
Until the government shutdown! When veterans from the Honor Flight program staged their own Occupy movement inside the cordoned-off plaza, their noncompliance quickly became a cause célèbre in the national press. (Why cover the sick kids getting locked out of their government-funded treatment, after all, when beckoned by the siren call of a Republican congressman’s photo op?) Over the weekend, quasi-celebrities Sarah Palin and Glenn Beck returned to the memorial with a trash-pickin’, Confederate-flag-wavin’ cast of thousands (except there was no trash to pick up).
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There are so many gods running around these days we need to be more specific.
The plaque is honoring Mars,Set, Bast (My favorite - Cat God of the Egyptians associated along with other things, war), Aries, Mars, Oden, Hadun, Kali, and of course, The Valkyries.
For a list of war gods and the cultures associated with them:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_war_deities
So , with all those Gods in all those cultures, what's the fuss?
thinks it is only right that god be "honored" on this memorial.
If there were, or if you believe there is, an omnipotent, omnipresent god, by definition his fingerprints are all over any war. As the man with the ultimate power, he rightfully has a place on the monument of said war. As God, he shouldn't just get credit for touchdowns, Olympic gold medals, and saving some children in a fiery bus crash while toasting others, he should also be feted for his more far-reaching projects - in this case world war.
And if you don't believe their is a god, well, some people want to honor a mythological presence on a war memorial. God knows, it wouldn't be the only mythology involved with a war memorial.
