Cross at Otley

  • Thread starter Thread starter Miri
  • Start date Start date
  • Christian Chat is a moderated online Christian community allowing Christians around the world to fellowship with each other in real time chat via webcam, voice, and text, with the Christian Chat app. You can also start or participate in a Bible-based discussion here in the Christian Chat Forums, where members can also share with each other their own videos, pictures, or favorite Christian music.

    If you are a Christian and need encouragement and fellowship, we're here for you! If you are not a Christian but interested in knowing more about Jesus our Lord, you're also welcome! Want to know what the Bible says, and how you can apply it to your life? Join us!

    To make new Christian friends now around the world, click here to join Christian Chat.
M

Miri

Guest
I don't know if this happens anywhere else, but every year these is a
place called Otley a car drive away from me. The local church puts a massive
cross up on the hill side at Easter every year. It can be seen for miles around.

It really does something, it's a hard to miss symbol of what Easter is really about,
a living testimony which is hard to ignore. :)


image.jpg

421392724.jpg


OtleyCrossBENLACK_468x302.jpg


2727231715.jpg
 
Nice :) It's a wonder some city ordinance hasn't deemed it too dangerous
or some such foolery as it not being allowed on public property or whatever :p
 
It looks beautiful in the sunset, Miri!

There are various places that have crosses year round. When I lived in Eugene, Oregon, a neon cross was put on one of the local mountains and could be seen at night from everywhere around the city. Of course, Oregon is quite liberal, and lots of people took issue with it. There were fights from day 1 to take it down. Sadly the opponents won in the end, and it had to be taken down. I guess this cross actually went up the year I lived in Eugene. I also climbed Skinner's Butte, and I have a vague memory of walking by the bottom of the cross.


"The City of Eugene ("City") maintains a public park on and around Skinner's Butte [sic], a hill cresting immediately north of the City's downtown business district. The land was donated to the City and has been maintained as a public park for many years. From the late 1930s to 1964, private individuals erected a succession of wooden crosses in the park, one replacing another as they deteriorated. In 1964, private individuals erected the cross at issue in this litigation. It is a fifty-one foot concrete Latin cross with neon inset tubing, and it is located at the crest of Skinner's Butte. The parties who erected the cross did not seek the City's permission to do so beforehand; however, they subsequently applied for and received from the City a building permit and an electrical permit.Since 1970, the City has illuminated the cross for seven days during the Christmas season, five days during the Thanksgiving season, and on Memorial Day, Independence Day, and Veteran's Day.The cross has been the subject of litigation since the time it was erected. In 1969, the Oregon Supreme Court held that the cross violated both the federal and the Oregon Constitutions because it was erected with a religious purpose and created the inference of official endorsement of Christianity. Lowe v. City of Eugene, 463 P.2d 360, 362-63 (Or. 1969), cert. denied, 397 U.S. 1042 , reh'g denied, 398 U.S. 944 (1970). Soon after, the City held a charter amendment election, and on May 26, 1970, the voters, by a wide margin, approved an amendment to the City Charter designating the cross a war memorial. Pursuant to that amendment, the cross was deeded to the City as a gift, and a bronze plaque was placed at the foot of the cross dedicating it as a memorial to war veterans. The Eugene City Charter provides that the "concrete cross on the south slope of the butte shall remain at that location and in that form as property of the city and is hereby dedicated as a memorial to the veterans of all wars in which the United States has participated."On June 14, 1997 and as a result of the 9th Federal Circuit's ruling, the cross was subsequently removed and reinstalled at Eugene Bible College near Churchill High School and a flagpole flying an American flag was erected in its place. U.S. Representative from Oregon Charles O. Porter was one of the people who had advocated for the removal of the cross."

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skinner_Butte
 
Golly! Look at all that space without skyscrapers, buildings, roads, and cars! Boggles my mind. I haven't seen so much just-land since my days of going to Canada to go fishing!

(You may not see civilizations in my park-pictures, but if they had sound too, you'd hear the cars, planes, helicopters, and people.)
 
The Otley cross has been a tradition every year since 1969!

No one dare mess with it lol.

Because it's so high up it just dominates everything in that area and can be clearly
seen for miles. Each year it's symbolism and what it stands for seems all the more
powerful, especially in an age where the Christian faith is being eroded.

I bet if it was a new thing someone wanted to start now, it would attract howls of
protest, but no one would dare now after all this time. :)
 
Golly! Look at all that space without skyscrapers, buildings, roads, and cars! Boggles my mind. I haven't seen so much just-land since my days of going to Canada to go fishing!

(You may not see civilizations in my park-pictures, but if they had sound too, you'd hear the cars, planes, helicopters, and people.)


We have all the above as well - our sky scrapers don't get much above 50 floors
though, apart from the occasional building. Lol
 
We have all the above as well - our sky scrapers don't get much above 50 floors
though, apart from the occasional building. Lol
It's still a skyscraper. I learned (not to be confused with this is the truth, merely what I learned when I was young), that a skyscraper is any building above 7 floors.

I also live in Philly. Until about 20 years ago, no building was allowed to be taller than "Billy Penn's hat." Billy Penn is a statue of the original guy who settled this area -- William Penn, (a Quaker.) His statue is above our City Hall, (link shows picture), so until a couple of decades we were known as a large city without any truly tall buildings in it.

Now we have several.


7d754d34ac48ecebfb2bc46e15dae253.jpg
 
A friend of ours is a photographer. He lives dow-na shore. (Philadelphian for "Lives along the New Jersey Shore." lol)

He just shared a photo of a cross on FB that's put up every year at North Wildwood, but he is a photographer, so I asked him (kindly), if I can copy/paste it with a real idea that me might not want me to because he can sell that photo. If he let's me, I'll post it here.

But, because I asked him, hubby did some googling for me, and discovered Chicago has such a cross. This is truly amazing, since most cities in the State won't display anything remotely Christian for holidays, yet the City of Chicago did this:
[url]https://www.thomasmoresociety.org/picasso-greets-jesus-in-daley-plaza-for-easter/[/URL]
 
I think over the years, I've tended to not notice crosses much, sort of taken
them for granted as being a common every day symbol. Especially as many
non Christians wear them.

But now with the erosion of Christian things and all this political correctness,
it warms my heart to see these large crosses set up for all to see.

Its like a moment of defiance and a strong reminder that God endures for ever.

Over easter there has been TV programmes which keep saying Christianity is
declining and who was Jesus, a cult figure etc. I keep thinking to myself that
TV programmes can speculate and lie and twist the easter story as much as
they want, but they will never over ride or conceal the truth.

Its on display for all to see, creation itself speaks of God and there is no hiding those
large crosses set up for all to see.