ACLU and Pagans Sue on Emblem for Graves

October 1, 2006

Pagans Sue on Emblem for Graves By LAURIE GOODSTEIN Published:

September 30, 2006 Military veterans are entitled to have their

headstones engraved by the government with a symbol of their religion.

Families of the deceased may choose from emblems representing a variety

of 18 Christian churches, a number of Buddhist sects, Judaism, Islam,

Sikhism, Hinduism and atheism (represented by an atom with an A inside)

— 38 religious symbols in all. But not the Wiccan pentacle, which

the Department of Veterans Affairs has neither approved nor disallowed

despite various petitions over the last nine years. Yesterday three

Wiccan families and two Wiccan churches sued to force the department to

include their symbol — a five-pointed star inside a circle — on

the list of approved emblems. Wiccans, also called pagans, are often

wrongly confused with Satanists. Theirs is a nature-based religion

recognized by the Internal Revenue Service, and by the military itself

in its chaplains' handbooks and on the dog tags that troops wear

around their necks. There are an increasing number of Wiccans

(pronounced WIK-ens) in the armed forces — 1,800, according to a

Pentagon survey cited in the suit. The American Civil Liberties Union,

representing the plaintiffs, brought the action in the United States

Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims, in Washington. A spokesman for the

V.A. did not respond to requests for an interview. In the years that

Wiccans have been petitioning, the department has approved emblems for

at least six groups, including the obscure Izumo Taishakyo Mission of

Hawaii. Kathleen Egbert, a Wiccan priestess in Laurel, Md., is among

the plaintiffs. Her father, Abraham Kooiman, fought in World War II and

received a Bronze Star and a Purple Heart. He died in 2001 at age 77 and

was buried in Arlington National Cemetery, a Wiccan without a symbol on

his headstone. " I'm angry, " Ms. Egbert said, " because

if pagans can fight and die for our country, we should be recognized by

our country the same way anyone else would be. "

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