What the Alito 'Appeal to Heaven' Flag Flap Is About, and the Spiritual Significance of the Banner

ANALYSIS

The U.S. Supreme Court is embroiled in a new controversy over a flag that some associate with the riot at the Capitol on January 6th. 

On that day, protesters carried a wide variety of signs, banners, and flags, many of them with hundreds of year of historical significance.

Among them was the so-called "Appeal to Heaven" banner or "Pine Tree Flag" – an emblem that dates back to the Revolutionary War to symbolize the fight against tyranny and "recognizing America's reliance on the protection and Providence of God," according to research by the Christian history organization WallBuilders.

But some now only associate it with January 6th because it was seen among the Capitol rioters. They're upset that the historic prayer flag was briefly seen hanging outside of Justice Samuel Alito's New Jersey home last summer, according to pictures obtained by the New York Times.

"It is true that this flag was very prominent in the charismatic Christian elements of Trump support through his presidency and definitely at the presidential election and lead up to January 6th. It became a very visible flag associated with that movement," Jack Jenkins, reporter with Religion News Service, told CBN's Faith Nation Wednesday. 

Because of the flag, critics are now urging Justice Alito to recuse himself from all January 6-related cases before the Supreme Court.  

Up until recently, though, the flag apparently wasn't that controversial, because the far-left city of San Francisco flew the "Appeal to Heaven" flag at its city hall headquarters since 1964. City officials didn't see a need to take it down for three years after January 6, but with activists fueling a firestorm against Alito, San Francisco took it down over the weekend.

In letters sent to members of Congress on Wednesday, Alito said his wife was responsible for flying an upside-down U.S. flag (a symbol of distress) over his home in 2021 and an "Appeal to Heaven" flag at his New Jersey beach house years later.
 
"As soon as I saw it, I asked my wife to take it down, but for several days, she refused," he wrote, adding that neither incident merits his recusal. "I am therefore duty-bound to reject your recusal request."

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Jenkins noted that House Speaker Mike Johnson also started hanging the flag outside his office shortly after becoming speaker adding, "It's always been a historic flag and it's always been a part of the American Revolution."
   
As CBN News has reported, Christians also used the "Appeal to Heaven" flag as a prayer symbol in prophetic prayer events long before anyone else might have used it on January 6.

Internationally known evangelist Dutch Sheets told CBN News in 2015 that he sees that flag as a symbol that God is taking America back to her spiritual roots.

"A lot of people don't know that we were born under a prayer movement with a flag that read, 'Appeal to Heaven,' but we were," he said.

Sheets recently explained in a YouTube video titled, "The Appeal to Heaven Flag," that George Washington used the flag during the Revolutionary War to inspire troops.

"This flag was actually used before the Stars and Stripes existed. In many ways it's the banner under which America was born," he explained.

"George Washington and his contemporaries grabbed a hold of this phrase in America's calls for freedom from Britain's tyranny having exhausted all peaceful possibilities of experiencing the Liberty they so desired," he continued.

"The colonists realized their only hope for freedom was through war, yet with Britain's great military weaponry and wealth contrasted by the colonists' dire lack of these resources, any military attempt to break free from British rule was preposterous, even laughable, that is unless Almighty God intervened," Sheets added.

The minister shared the colonists chose to "partner with and honor God" and they eventually experienced freedom and favor upon the land.

"(The flag) became the symbol of these colonists' unwavering spirit of liberty as well as a clear statement of where they placed their faith," Sheets expressed.

Then in 2018, long before the controversial election in 2020, Sheets told CBN News the flag wasn't so much a political symbol as a reminder of our dependence on God, and he called for a prophetic appeal to heaven for a global harvest of souls. 

At that time, Sheets pointed again to that flag as he rallied fellow Christians to launch a "worldwide prayer movement" to seek revival in America and a billion souls to come to Christ around the globe.

"This is all about what God wants to do around the world. I believe we'll see more people saved in the next 20 years than we have in the previous 2,000," Sheets predicted. "I think it'll be in the billions. Not the 'm,' but the 'b.' The billions. I think Asia is about to get hit with a tidal wave of revival. And I think it's going right into the Middle East."

He predicted in 2018, "I believe it's this incredible harvest that has been prophesied for so long, we're moving into now. The best days of the Church are not behind us. They are ahead of us."

So while some in D.C. and San Francisco may only view the flag as a political symbol of revolt, others genuinely see it as a call to prayer for God to move across the earth and send a spiritual awakening.