Follow up - the City of Santa Monica won, they don't have to pay to guard people's nativity scenes in public parks.

This is what all the bruhaha was about? I can't imagine, with the economy the way it is, people thought this would be a good use of city funds.

Churches are the natural place for....church related things.

 So again, why can't churches use their own property instead of government property to set up a nativity?

What says our religion is true more than your goverment supporting it. Of course some people have a difficult time understanding goverment buildings are not meant for religious displays.... Unless its another religion then they seem to understand.

Good for the city. They are being fair to the community and reasonable with their limited resources. There were more requests from the community than available spaces so they held a lottery. And I didn't see any concerns of it being rigged - merely open to all in the community... which is what is fair, right? As was previousely pointed out, community resources should be open to everyone in the community, not just one special group. Since the lottery results pissed off one group who then escalated the fight, the city decided it couldn't afford to deal with this mess, so they closed the option to ALL (including the groups who fairly won spots in the lottery). Certainly seems like the churches who think they deserve more consideration than other members of the community, are forgetting what "fair" acutally means.

You've gotta be shittin me, HHx5. Do some research into this story. I remember this story from last xmas and the christians were all butthurt because they weren't shown favoritism. Religious privilege is what really irks me.

It's a good question and a fair one. I think one of the big issues is the fact that this was a tradition that was established and continued for a number of years (close to 60) so the problem is is that people have a hard time accepting change. People want to keep going with their tradition and when it's ended, it causes a lot of hurt feelings. That's understandable but they sort of did it to themselves by not wanting to play fair. The dynamics of our country has changed. No longer is this a country where nearly everyone goes to church every Sunday. We have more religious beliefs out there than ever and because of that it means that things cannot remain the same. It's just something that has to be accepted and dealt with. Nothing lasts forever.

Good. This is the first I've heard about this, but that's ridiculous.

Damn good question.

glad that got worked out.
So where else will the nativity scene pop up, aside from churchs' front lawns?

I think the one sign with the tree is in bad taste. The reason being that it has nothing to do with improving anything, it is just bashing someone else. That is a sad way to live but that is their ritght too.