Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/18pdf/17-1717_4f14.pdf
Page Number: 73

Cite as:  588 U. S. ____ (2019) 

7 

GINSBURG,  J., dissenting 

the teacher’s purpose is to educate, not to proselytize.  The 
Peace Cross, however, is not of that genre. 

II 
A 
  “For nearly two millennia,” the Latin cross has been the 
“defining  symbol”  of  Christianity, R. Jensen, The Cross: 
History, Art, and Controversy ix (2017), evoking the foun-
dational  claims  of  that  faith.    Christianity  teaches  that 
Jesus  Christ  was  “a  divine Savior” who “illuminate[d] a 
path toward salvation and redemption.”  Lynch, 465 U. S., 
at  708  (Brennan, J., dissenting).  Central to the religion 
are the beliefs that “the son of God,” Jesus Christ, “died on 
the  cross,”  that  “he  rose  from  the  dead,”  and  that  “his 
death and resurrection offer the possibility of eternal life.”  
Brief  for  Amici  Christian  and  Jewish  Organizations  7.6  
“From  its  earliest  times,”  Christianity  was  known  as 
“religio  crucis—the  religion  of the cross.”  R. Viladesau, 
The Beauty of the Cross: The Passion of Christ in Theol- 
ogy and the Arts, From the Catacombs to the Eve of the 
Renaissance 7 (2006).  Christians wear crosses, not as an 
ecumenical  symbol,  but  to  proclaim  their  adherence  to 
Christianity. 
  An exclusively Christian symbol, the Latin cross is not 
emblematic  of  any  other  faith.    Buono,  559  U. S.,  at 747 
(Stevens,  J.,  dissenting);  Viladesau,  supra,  at  7  (“[T]he 
cross  and  its  meaning  . . .  set  Christianity  apart  from 
other world religions.”).7  The principal symbol of Christi-
—————— 

6 Under  “one  widespread  reading  of  Christian  scriptures,”  non-
Christians are barred from eternal life and, instead, are condemned to 
hell.    Brief  for  Amici  Christian  and  Jewish  Organizations  2.    On this 
reading,  the  Latin  cross  symbolizes both the promise of salvation and 
the threat of damnation by “divid[ing] the world between the saved and 
the damned.”  Id., at 12. 

7 Christianity  comprises  numerous denominations.  The term is here 
used  to distinguish Christian sects from religions that do not embrace 
the defining tenets of Christianity.