Last weekend, thieves stole away the renowned 7-foot metal cross in the Mojave Desert, which was first erected in 1934 as a World War I memorial. The Mojave Cross is recognizable across the world as a famed landmark, but recently has been the centre of controversy. A legal protest was filed to remove the cross because it was beleived to be religiously exclusive and therefore did not properly represent the many Jewish (or those of other faiths) Americans who lost their lives during World War I.
A local court ordered its removal, but last month the Supreme Court overruled this ruling, and scolded the lower court for concentrating "solely on the religious aspects of the cross, divorced from its background and context."
This particular "cross in the desert evokes far more than religion. It evokes thousands of small crosses in foreign fields marking the graves of Americans who fell in battles, battles whose tragedies are compounded if the fallen are forgotten," Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote in the 5-4 decision.
The group in charge of the cross, the Veterans of Foreign Wars have vowed to find or replace the war memorial, says the Washington Post.
(To read the full story, please go to http://washingtonpost/onfaith/com)