AF Base Under Fire for Crèche, Menorah Displays

Officials at Travis Air Force Base, Calif., are talking with lawyers in response to a watchdog group’s demand that the base relocate its Christian nativity and Hanukkah menorah displays from an open space to the base chapel.

“As of right now, we are reviewing the concerns of the [Military Religious Freedom Foundation] and consulting with our legal experts and our higher headquarters,” base spokesman Johnathan Monroe told Military.com.

It’s not only the MRFF that wants the religious displays moved. The California Council of Churches, which represents about 5,500 Protestant congregations with about 1.5 million members, has added its own voice to the foundation’s request.

“We would ask that you keep faith entirely personal for each and every individual,” the council’s director of public policy, Elizabeth Sholes, wrote in a letter to 60th Air Mobility Wing commander Col. Dwight Sones. “We support MRFF’s request that you move the crèche to the chapel grounds so that Travis AFB is not perceived to be promoting Christian religious messages as if they were national policy.”

The crèche and menorah are among more than a dozen holiday displays running along two sides of a green area by a main intersection on the base. Many of the displays appear to be holiday season themed displays, including “Happy Holidays,” “Seasons Greetings” and at least one featuring Santa Claus, according to photos provided by the base.

MRFF attorney Katherine Ritchey, in her letter to the base commander, says she understands there is only one secular display. She also noted that the crèche is the tallest display and is in the center.

While courts have ruled in favor of religious displays as part of a larger, inclusive and secular holiday display, Ritchey wrote that the overall Christian religious theme of the Travis display, along with the central location and height of the crèche, sends “a clear message to viewers that the Air Force endorses rituals and beliefs associated with that faith.”

MRFF founder Mikey Weinstein said he represents more than 100 clients at the base, the vast majority of them mainline Protestants and Catholics.

Travis is not the only California military installation involved in a dispute over a religious display.

The commander of Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton is under pressure by MRFF and other groups to remove a 13-foot tall cross from a hilltop where it was raised over Veterans Day weekend by Marines who wanted to honor fallen comrades.

Col. Nicholas Marano has also received a letter from Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-Calif., urging him to leave the cross in place.

"Honoring those and other Marines with a memorial at Camp Pendleton is a fitting tribute that represents the fighting spirit of the Marine Corps and those Marines' extraordinary personal sacrifice," wrote Hunter, a Marine veteran.