By Donald H. Harrison

SAN DIEGO, Calif.— The news reported today that Philip Paulson, the atheist who launched the constitutional suit against the Mt. Soledad Cross some 17 years ago, is dying of liver cancer.  I would like to take this occasion to salute him!

Paulson, 59,  is a man who is standing up for his beliefs, who refuses to be intimidated by the threat of public opprobrium, and whose legacy may well be a clearer definition of the meaning of the constitutional doctrine of Church and State.  

For those contributions, we should all thank him..  And I'm glad that I have the opportunity to do so, here, while he is still alive to read it.  Philip Paulson, you are a great American.  All of us—whether we be atheists or religious—owe you a debt for your courage and tenacity.

As I have written before, we in the Jewish community were negligent in adopting the attitude, "Let Phil do it!" because his lawsuit brought to the courts a critical question that affected us as a community. He saw, while for the most part we ignored, the fact that if the cross is to stand on public land as a symbol of the  "sacrifice" that veterans like himself made, that it improperly conflates religion and patriotism as national values.  The twovalues  must be considered apart.

Recently, the American Civil Liberties Union filed a suit on behalf of some individual plaintiffs and the Jewish War Veterans, so belatedly at least one arm of our community is taking a very public stand.  Paulson clearly led the way.  Until recently, he was the fighter engaging the ideological adversary, the brave soldier walking point,  while we were content to remain, in safety, well behind the front lines.

Ever savvy, Paulson suggested in an article by Kelly Thornton in today's San Diego Union-Tribune that someone likely would try to describe what has been diagnosed as his terminal cancer as "God's revenge."

He's probably correct that there may be somebody who will say that and actually believe it.

However, I find it difficult to believe that any religious person of intellectual substance could seriously hold to such an argument—no matter how they might feel about the cross.  If sickness and death were punishments from God, how could we explain people with exactly opposite views of Paulson's being afflicted with the same disease?  How indeed would we interpret the large number of victims in various  historic events—such as the Holocaust, for example, or 9/11, or Hurricane Katrina?

In that Paulson obviously is a battler, I hope he will be able to wrestle his cancer into remission, so that he will see how the very important and worthwhile issue that he raised turns out.

But no matter what occurs, he should know there are many people on both sides of the theological divide who consider him a very important figure in our city and country.