Last modified: Thursday, April 26, 2007 1:41 AM EDT Wiccan soldiers win star of respect How fitting that daffodils bobbed up Monday and area magnolias unfurled like silent celebratory fireworks, the very day the government grudgingly added the Wiccan pentacle to the long list of emblems permitted on government-issued headstones of soldiers and in national cemeteries. Recognition of life cycles - so manifest in the explosion of beauty around these parts in late April - is fundamental to Wicca, a nature-based religion. Some might argue that Wiccans were reverent toward the environment long before many of the rest of us caught on, the result of dire warnings related to global warming. We welcome Monday's settlement between Wiccans and the government, a settlement that will now mean the five-pointed star, the pentacle, can be added to grave markers. It's unfortunate that recognition necessitated a standoff. The very personal beliefs of soldiers who serve their country should be honored without bias and without stonewalling. Already the Veterans Administration had recognized 38 symbols, ranging from those of majority religions to those practiced in relative obscurity. "This settlement has forced the Bush Administration into acknowledging that there are no second class religions in America, including among our nation's veterans," said the Rev. Barry W. Lynn, director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, which represented the Wiccans in the lawsuit, in an Associated Press story. President George W. Bush remarked in a 1999 ABC News interview on Ft. Hood's decision to allow Wiccan rituals: "I don't think that witchcraft is a religion. I wish the military would rethink this decision." Wiccans live in harmony with nature, follow the cycles of the sun and moon, and see the divine spirit in all things, including animals and plants, members of the Circle of Salgion, Church of Wicca, which originated in Rehoboth, have often explained. To them, divine energy is both a god and a goddess, who take different names and forms. Resistance to the Wicca grave marker, we imagine, was not only unalloyed discrimination but a reflection of knee-jerk ignorance regarding intention and practices of Wicca. With Monday's ruling comes victory for soldiers whose beliefs should have been honored by their country without forcing them into one last battle.