Brief challenges effort to remove Jesus statue

U.S. Rep. Denny Rehberg was the lead signer last week on a legal brief that supports leaving the Jesus statue on Big Mountain.

The amicus brief was filed by the American Center for Law and Justice in U.S. District Court in Missoula. An amicus brief is a legal document filed in support of one side of a legal proceeding.

The brief asks that a lawsuit filed by the Freedom From Religion Foundation be dismissed because it fails to show harm has been done by the statue’s presence.

The Jesus statue has stood on a 25-by-25 foot parcel of U.S. Forest Service land for roughly 60 years as a veterans memorial. Last year the Forest Service rejected, and then later reversed its decision, for renewal of a special use permit for the land on which the statue sits above Chair 2 at Whitefish Mountain Resort. The statue was originally erected by members of the 10th Mountain Division in honor of their service during World War II.

The forest service eventually reversed its decision based upon the determination that the statue may be eligible for listing on the National Register of Historic Places. In response, the Wisconsin-based FFRF group sued in U.S. District Court to force removal.

“This historically significant piece of Montana history belongs on Big Mountain,” Rehberg said in a prepared release. “For nearly six decades, it’s been there. In all that time, it’s never hurt a single person let alone an anti-religion group in Wisconsin who, as far as I can tell, have never even seen the statue. This lawsuit is wasting time and money, and I hope the court will do the right thing and throw it out.”

The lawsuit names the U.S. Forest Service and Flathead Supervisor Chip Weber as defendants. The Knights of Columbus, who have cared for the statue, have intervenor status in the case. It argues that the special-use permit is an unconstitutional state endorsement of religion.

The American Center for Law and Justice is a conservative Christian group founded by Pat Robertson and is not named in the case. However, the group filed a brief on behalf of Rehberg and 17 other members of Congress.

The brief says that FFRF has failed to name specific members who have been “offended” by the statue. It goes onto to claim that the “alleged injury is nothing more than offended observer” and that psychological injury caused by observation is not a legally protected concrete injury.