Chief Justice Burger
delivered the opinion of the Court.
We granted certiorari to decide whether the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment prohibits a municipality [671]*671from including a créche, or Nativity scene, in its annual Christmas display.
I
Each year, in cooperation with the downtown retail merchants’ association, the city of Pawtucket, R. L, erects a Christmas display as part of its observance of the Christmas holiday season. The display is situated in a park owned by a nonprofit organization and located in the heart of the shopping district. The display is essentially like those to be found in hundreds of towns or cities across the Nation — often on public grounds — during the Christmas season. The Paw-tucket display comprises many of the figures and decorations traditionally associated with Christmas, including, among other things, a Santa Claus house, reindeer pulling Santa’s sleigh, candy-striped poles, a Christmas tree, carolers, cutout figures representing such characters as a clown, an elephant, and a teddy bear, hundreds of colored lights, a large banner that reads “SEASONS GREETINGS,” and the créche at issue here. All components of this display are owned by the city.
The créche, which has been included in the display for 40 or more years, consists of the traditional figures, including the Infant Jesus, Mary and Joseph, angels, shepherds, kings, and animals, all ranging in height from 5" to 5'. In 1973, when the present créche was acquired, it cost the city $1,365; it now is valued at $200. The erection and dismantling of the créche costs the city about $20 per year; nominal expenses are incurred in lighting the créche. No money has been expended on its maintenance for the past 10 years.
Respondents, Pawtucket residents and individual members of the Rhode Island affiliate of the American Civil Liberties Union, and the affiliate itself, brought this action in the United States District Court for Rhode Island, challenging the city’s inclusion of the créche in the annual display. The District Court held that the city’s inclusion of the créche in the display violates the Establishment Clause, 525 F. Supp. 1150, 1178 (1981), which is binding on the states through the [672]*672Fourteenth Amendment. The District Court found that, by including the créche in the Christmas display, the city has “tried to endorse and promulgate religious beliefs,” id., at 1173, and that “erection of the creche has the real and substantial effect of affiliating the City with the Christian beliefs that the creche represents.” Id., at 1177. This “appearance of official sponsorship,” it believed, “confers more than a remote and incidental benefit on Christianity.” Id., at 1178. Last, although the court acknowledged the absence of administrative entanglement, it found that excessive entanglement has been fostered as a result of the political divisiveness of including the créche in the celebration. Id., at 1179-1180. The city was permanently enjoined from including the créche in the display.
A divided panel of the Court of Appeals for the First Circuit affirmed. 691 F. 2d 1029 (1982). We granted certiorari, 460 U. S. 1080 (1983), and we reverse.
I — l i-
A
This Court has explained that the purpose of the Establishment and Free Exercise Clauses of the First Amendment is
“to prevent, as far as possible, the intrusion of either [the church or the state] into the precincts of the other.” Lemon v. Kurtzman, 403 U. S. 602, 614 (1971).
At the same time, however, the Court has recognized that
“total separation is not possible in an absolute sense. Some relationship between government and religious organizations is inevitable.” Ibid.
In every Establishment Clause case, we must reconcile the inescapable tension between the objective of preventing unnecessary intrusion of either the church or the state upon the other, and the reality that, as the Court has so often noted, total separation of the two is not possible.
[673]*673The Court has sometimes described the Religion Clauses as erecting a “wall” betwéen church and state, see, e. g., Everson v. Board of Education, 330 U. S. 1, 18 (1947). The concept of a “wall” of separation is a useful figure of speech probably deriving from views of Thomas Jefferson.1 The metaphor has served as a reminder that the Establishment Clause forbids an established church or anything approaching it. But the metaphor itself is not a wholly accurate description of the practical aspects of the relationship that in fact exists between church and state.
No significant segment of our society and no institution within it can exist in a vacuum or in total or absolute isolation from all the other parts, much less from government. “It has never been thought either possible or desirable to enforce a regime of total separation . . . .” Committee for Public Education & Religious Liberty v. Nyquist, 413 U. S. 756, 760 (1973). Nor does the Constitution require complete separation of church and state; it affirmatively mandates accommodation, not merely tolerance, of all religions, and forbids hostility toward any. See, e. g., Zorach v. Clauson, 343 U. S. 306, 314, 315 (1952); Illinois ex rel. McCollum v. Board of Education, 333 U. S. 203, 211 (1948). Anything less would require the “callous indifference” we have said was never intended by the Establishment Clause. Zorach, swpra, at 314. Indeed, we have observed, such hostility would bring us into “war with our national tradition as embodied in the First Amendment’s guaranty of the free exercise of religion.” McCollum, supra, at 211-212.
B
The Court’s interpretation of the Establishment Clause has comported with what history reveals was the contemporaneous understanding of its guarantees. A significant example [674]*674of the contemporaneous understanding of that Clause is found in the events of the first week of the First Session of the First Congress in 1789. In the very week that Congress approved the Establishment Clause as part of the Bill of Rights for submission to the states, it enacted legislation providing for paid Chaplains for the House and Senate. In Marsh v. Chambers, 463 U. S. 783 (1983), we noted that 17 Members of that First Congress had been Delegates to the Constitutional Convention where freedom of speech, press, and religion and antagonism toward an established church were subjects of frequent discussion. We saw no conflict with the Establishment Clause when Nebraska employed members of the clergy as official legislative Chaplains to give opening prayers at sessions of the state legislature. Id., at 791.
The interpretation of the Establishment Clause by Congress in 1789 takes on special significance in light of the Court’s emphasis that the First Congress
“was a Congress whose constitutional decisions have always been regarded, as they should be regarded, as of the greatest weight in the interpretation of that fundamental instument,” Myers v. United States, 272 U. S. 52, 174-175 (1926).
It is clear that neither the 17 draftsmen of the Constitution who were Members of the First Congress, nor the Congress of 1789, saw any establishment problem in the employment of congressional Chaplains to offer daily prayers in the Congress, a practice that has continued for nearly two centuries. It would be difficult to identify a more striking example of the accommodation of religious belief intended by the Framers.
C
There is an unbroken history of official acknowledgment by all three branches of government of the role of religion in American life from at least 1789. Seldom in our opinions was this more affirmatively expressed than in Justice Douglas’ opinion for the Court validating a program allowing release of [675]*675public school students from classes to attend off-campus religious exercises. Rejecting a claim that the program violated the Establishment Clause, the Court asserted pointedly:
“We are a religious people whose institutions presuppose a Supreme Being.” Zorach v. Clauson, supra, at 313.
See also Abington School District v. Schempp, 374 U. S. 203, 213 (1963).
Our history is replete with official references to the value and invocation of Divine guidance in deliberations and pronouncements of the Founding Fathers and contemporary leaders. Beginning in the early colonial period long before Independence, a day of Thanksgiving was celebrated as a religious holiday to give thanks for the bounties of Nature as gifts from God. President Washington and his successors proclaimed Thanksgiving, with all its religious overtones, a day of national celebration2 and Congress made it a National Holiday more than a century ago. Ch. 167, 16 Stat. 168. That holiday has not lost its theme of expressing thanks for Divine aid3 any more than has Christmas lost its religious significance.
[676]*676Executive Orders and other official announcements of Presidents and of the Congress have proclaimed both Christmas and Thanksgiving National Holidays in religious terms. And, by Acts of Congress, it has long been the practice that federal employees are released from duties on these National Holidays, while being paid from the same public revenues that provide the compensation of the Chaplains of the Senate and the House and the military services. See J. Res. 5, 23 Stat. 516. Thus, it is clear that Government has long recognized — indeed it has subsidized — holidays with religious significance.
Other examples of reference to our religious heritage are found in the statutorily prescribed national motto “In God We Trust,” 36 U. S. C. § 186, which Congress and the President mandated for our currency, see 31 U. S. C. § 5112(d)(1) (1982 ed.), and in the language “One nation under God,” as part of the Pledge of Allegiance to the American flag. That pledge is recited by many thousands of public school children — and adults — every year.
Art galleries supported by public revenues display religious paintings of the 15th and 16th centuries, predominantly inspired by one religious faith. The National Gallery in [677]*677Washington, maintained with Government support, for example, has long exhibited masterpieces with religious messages, notably the Last Supper, and paintings depicting the Birth of Christ, the Crucifixion, and the Resurrection, among many others with explicit Christian themes and messages.4 The very chamber in which oral arguments on this case were heard is decorated with a notable and permanent — not seasonal — symbol of religion: Moses with the Ten Commandments. Congress has long provided chapels in the Capitol for religious worship and meditation.
There are countless other illustrations of the Government’s acknowledgment of our religious heritage and governmental sponsorship of graphic manifestations of that heritage. Congress has directed the President to proclaim a National Day of Prayer each year “on which [day] the people of the United States may turn to God in prayer and meditation at churches, in groups, and as individuals.” 36 U. S. C. §169h. Our Presidents have repeatedly issued such Proclamations.5 Presidential Proclamations and messages have also issued to commemorate Jewish Heritage Week, Presidential Proclamation No. 4844, 3 CFR 30 (1982), and the Jewish High Holy Days, 17 Weekly Comp, of Pres. Doc. 1058 (1981). One cannot look at even this brief résumé without finding that our history is pervaded by expressions of religious beliefs such as are found in Zorach. Equally pervasive is the evidence of accommodation of all faiths and all forms of religious expression, and hostility toward none. Through this accommoda[678]*678tion, as Justice Douglas observed, governmental action has “follow[ed] the best of our traditions” and “respect[ed] the religious nature of our people.” 343 U. S., at 314.
Ill
This history may help explain why the Court consistently has declined to take a rigid, absolutist view of the Establishment Clause. We have refused “to construe the Religion Clauses with a literalness that would undermine the ultimate constitutional objective as illuminated by history.” Walz v. Tax Comm’n, 397 U. S. 664, 671 (1970) (emphasis added). In our modern, complex society, whose traditions and constitutional underpinnings rest on and encourage diversity and pluralism in all areas, an absolutist approach in applying the Establishment Clause is simplistic and has been uniformly rejected by the Court.
Rather than mechanically invalidating all governmental conduct or statutes that confer benefits or give special recognition to religion in general or to one faith—as an absolutist approach would dictate—the Court has scrutinized challenged legislation or official conduct to determine whether, in reality, it establishes a religion or religious faith, or tends to do so. See Walz, supra, at 669. Joseph Story wrote a century and a half ago:
“The real object of the [First] Amendment was ... to prevent any national ecclesiastical establishment, which should give to an hierarchy the exclusive patronage of the national government.” 3 J. Story, Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States 728 (1833).
In each case, the inquiry calls for line-drawing; no fixed, per se rule can be framed. The Establishment Clause like the Due Process Clauses is not a precise, detailed provision in a legal code capable of ready application. The purpose of the Establishment Clause “was to state an objective, not to write a statute.” Walz, supra, at 668. The line between permissible relationships and those barred by the Clause can no [679]*679more be straight and unwavering than due process can be defined in a single stroke or phrase or test. The Clause erects a “blurred, indistinct, and variable barrier depending on all the circumstances of a particular relationship.” Lemon, 403 U. S., at 614.
In the line-drawing process we have often found it useful to inquire whether the challenged law or conduct has a secular purpose, whether its principal or primary effect is to advance or inhibit religion, and whether it creates an excessive entanglement of government with religion. Lemon, supra. But, we have repeatedly emphasized our unwillingness to be confined to any single test or criterion in this sensitive area. See, e. g., Tilton v. Richardson, 403 U. S. 672, 677-678 (1971); Nyquist, 413 U. S., at 773. In two cases, the Court did not even apply the Lemon “test.” We did not, for example, consider that analysis relevant in Marsh v. Chambers, 463 U. S. 783 (1983). Nor did we find Lemon useful in Larson v. Valente, 456 U. S. 228 (1982), where there was substantial evidence of overt discrimination against a particular church.
In this case, the focus of our inquiry must be on the créche in the context of the Christmas season. See, e. g., Stone v. Graham, 449 U. S. 39 (1980) (per curiam); Abington School District v. Schempp, 374 U. S. 203 (1963). In Stone, for example, we invalidated a state statute requiring the posting of a copy of the Ten Commandments on public classroom walls. But the Court carefully pointed out that the Commandments were posted purely as a religious admonition, not “integrated into the school curriculum, where the Bible may constitutionally be used in an appropriate study of history, civilization, ethics, comparative religion, or the like.” 449 U. S., at 42. Similarly, in Abington, although the Court struck down the practices in two States requiring daily Bible readings in public schools, it specifically noted that nothing in the Court’s holding was intended to “indicate] that such study of the Bible or of religion, when presented objectively as part of a secular program of education, may not be effected consist[680]*680ently with the First Amendment.” 374 U. S., at 225. Focus exclusively on the religious component of any activity would inevitably lead to its invalidation under the Establishment Clause.
The Court has invalidated legislation or governmental action on the ground that a secular purpose was lacking, but only when it has concluded there was no question that the statute or activity was motivated wholly by religious considerations. See, e. g., Stone v. Graham, supra, at 41; Epperson v. Arkansas, 393 U. S. 97, 107-109 (1968); Abington School District v. Schempp, supra, at 223-224; Engel v. Vitale, 370 U. S. 421, 424-425 (1962). Even where the benefits to religion were substantial, as in Everson v. Board of Education, 330 U. S. 1 (1947); Board of Education v. Allen, 392 U. S. 236 (1968); Walz, supra; and Tilton, supra, we saw a secular purpose and no conflict with the Establishment Clause. Cf. Larkin v. Grendel’s Den, Inc., 459 U. S. 116 (1982).
The District Court inferred from the religious nature of the creche that the city has no secular purpose for the display. In so doing, it rejected the city’s claim that its reasons for including the créche are essentially the same as its reasons for sponsoring the display as a whole. The District Court plainly erred by focusing almost exclusively on the créche. When viewed in the proper context of the Christmas Holiday season, it is apparent that, on this record, there is insufficient evidence to establish that the inclusion of the créche is a purposeful or surreptitious effort to express some kind of subtle governmental advocacy of a particular religious message. In a pluralistic society a variety of motives and purposes are implicated. The city, like the Congresses and Presidents, however, has principally taken note of a significant historical religious event long celebrated in the Western World. The créche in the display depicts the historical origins of this traditional event long recognized as a National Holiday. See Allen v. Hickel, 138 U. S. App. D. C. 31, 424 F. 2d 944 [681]*681(1970); Citizens Concerned, for Separation of Church and State v. City and County of Denver, 526 F. Supp. 1310 (Colo. 1981).
The narrow question is whether there is a secular purpose for Pawtucket’s display of the créche. The display is sponsored by the city to celebrate the Holiday and to depict the origins of that Holiday. These are legitimate secular purposes.6 The District Court’s inference, drawn from the religious nature of the creche, that the city has no secular purpose was, on this record, clearly erroneous.7
The District Court found that the primary effect of including the créche is to confer a substantial and impermissible benefit on religion in general and on the Christian faith in particular. Comparisons of the relative benefits to religion of different forms of governmental support are elusive and difficult to make. But to conclude that the primary effect of including the créche is to advance religion in violation of the Establishment Clause would require that we view it as more beneficial to and more an endorsement of religion, for example, than expenditure of large sums of public money for textbooks supplied throughout the country to students attending church-sponsored schools, Board of Education v. Allen, supra;8 expenditure of public funds for transportation of [682]*682students to church-sponsored schools, Everson v. Board of Education, supra;9 federal grants for college buildings of church-sponsored institutions of higher education combining secular and religious education, Tilton v. Richardson, 403 U. S. 672 (1971);10 noncategorical grants to church-sponsored colleges and universities, Roemer v. Board of Public Works, 426 U. S. 736 (1976); and the tax exemptions for church properties sanctioned in Walz v. Tax Comm’n, 397 U. S. 664 (1970). It would also require that we view it as more of an endorsement of religion than the Sunday Closing Laws upheld in McGowan v. Maryland, 366 U. S. 420 (1961);11 the release time program for religious training in Zorach v. Clauson, 343 U. S. 306 (1952); and the legislative prayers upheld in Marsh v. Chambers, 463 U. S. 783 (1983).
We are unable to discern a greater aid to religion deriving from inclusion of the creche than from these benefits and endorsements previously held not violative of the Establishment Clause. What was said about the legislative prayers in Marsh, supra, at 792, and implied about the Sunday Closing Laws in McGowan is true of the city’s inclusion of the créche: its “reason or effect merely happens to coincide or harmonize with the tenets of some . . . religions.” See McGowan, supra, at 442.
This case differs significantly from Larkin v. Grendel’s Den, Inc., supra, and McCollum, where religion was sub[683]*683stantially aided. In Grendel’s Den, important governmental power — a licensing veto authority — had been vested in churches. In McCollum, government had made religious instruction available in public school classrooms; the State had not only used the public school buildings for the teaching of religion, it had “afford[ed] sectarian groups an invaluable aid • • • [by] providing] pupils for their religious classes through use of the State’s compulsory public school machinery.” 333 U. S., at 212. No comparable benefit to religion is discernible here.
The dissent asserts some observers may perceive that the city has aligned itself with the Christian faith by including a Christian symbol in its display and that this serves to advance religion. We can assume, arguendo, that the display advances religion in a sense; but our precedents plainly contemplate that on occasion some advancement of religion will result from governmental action. The Court has made it abundantly clear, however, that “not every law that confers an ‘indirect,’ ‘remote,’ or ‘incidental’ benefit upon [religion] is, for that reason alone, constitutionally invalid.” Nyquist, 413 U. S., at 771; see also Widmar v. Vincent, 454 U. S. 263, 273 (1981). Here, whatever benefit there is to one faith or religion or to all religions, is indirect, remote, and incidental; display of the créche is no more an advancement or endorsement of religion than the Congressional and Executive recognition of the origins of the Holiday itself as “Christ’s Mass,” or the exhibition of literally hundreds of religious paintings in governmentally supported museums.
The District Court found that there had been no administrative entanglement between religion and state resulting from the city’s ownership and use of the créche. 525 F. Supp., at 1179. But it went on to hold that some political divisiveness was engendered by this litigation. Coupled with its finding of an impermissible sectarian purpose and effect, this persuaded the court that there was “excessive entanglement.” The Court of Appeals expressly declined to [684]*684accept the District Court’s finding that inclusion of the creche has caused political divisiveness along religious lines, and noted that this Court has never held that political divisiveness alone was sufficient to invalidate government conduct.
Entanglement is a question of kind and degree. In this case, however, there is no reason to disturb the District Court’s finding on the absence of administrative entanglement. There is no evidence of contact with church authorities concerning the content or design of the exhibit prior to or since Pawtucket’s purchase of the créche. No expenditures for maintenance of the creche have been necessary; and since the city owns the creche, now valued at $200, the tangible material it contributes is de minimis. In many respects the display requires far less ongoing, day-to-day interaction between church and state than religious paintings in public galleries. There is nothing here, of course, like the “comprehensive, discriminating, and continuing state surveillance” or the “enduring entanglement” present in Lemon, 403 U. S., at 619-622.
The Court of Appeals correctly observed that this Court has not held that political divisiveness alone can serve to invalidate otherwise permissible conduct. And we decline to so hold today. This case does not involve a direct subsidy to church-sponsored schools or colleges, or other religious institutions, and hence no inquiry into potential political divisiveness is even called for, Mueller v. Allen, 463 U. S. 388, 403-404, n. 11 (1983). In any event, apart from this litigation there is no evidence of political friction or divisiveness over the créche in the 40-year history of Pawtucket’s Christmas celebration. The District Court stated that the inclusion of the créche for the 40 years has been “marked by no apparent dissension” and that the display has had a “calm history.” 525 F. Supp., at 1179. Curiously, it went on to hold that the political divisiveness engendered by this lawsuit was evidence of excessive entanglement. A litigant cannot, by the very act of commencing a lawsuit, however, create the ap[685]*685pearance of divisiveness and then exploit it as evidence of entanglement.
We are satisfied that the city has a secular purpose for including the créche, that the city has not impermissibly advanced religion, and that including the créche does not create excessive entanglement between religion and government.
> HH
Justice Brennan describes the creche as a “re-creation of an event that lies at the heart of Christian faith,” post, at 711. The créche, like a painting, is passive; admittedly it is a reminder of the origins of Christmas. Even the traditional, purely secular displays extant at Christmas, with or without a creche, would inevitably recall the religious nature of the Holiday. The display engenders a friendly community spirit of goodwill in keeping with the season. The créche may well have special meaning to those whose faith includes the celebration of religious Masses, but none who sense the origins of the Christmas celebration would fail to be aware of its religious implications. That the display brings people into the central city, and serves commercial interests and benefits merchants and their employees, does not, as the dissent points out, determine the character of the display. That a prayer invoking Divine guidance in Congress is preceded and followed by debate and partisan conflict over taxes, budgets, national defense, and myriad mundane subjects, for example, has never been thought to demean or taint the sacredness of the invocation.12
Of course the créche is identified with one religious faith but no more so than the examples we have set out from prior cases in which we found no conflict with the Establishment [686]*686Clause. See, e. g., McGowan v. Maryland, 366 U. S. 420 (1961); Marsh v. Chambers, 463 U. S. 783 (1983). It would be ironic, however, if the inclusion of a single symbol of a particular historic religious event, as part of a celebration acknowledged in the Western World for 20 centuries, and in this country by the people, by the Executive Branch, by the Congress, and the courts for 2 centuries, would so “taint” the city’s exhibit as to render it violative of the Establishment Clause. To forbid the use of this one passive symbol — the créche — at the very time people are taking note of the season with Christmas hymns and carols in public schools and other public places, and while the Congress and legislatures open sessions with prayers by paid chaplains, would be a stilted overreaction contrary to our history and to our holdings. If the presence of the créche in this display violates the Establishment Clause, a host of other forms of taking official note of Christmas, and of our religious heritage, are equally offensive to the Constitution.
The Court has acknowledged that the “fears and political problems” that gave rise to the Religion Clauses in the 18th century are of far less concern today. Everson, 330 U. S., at 8. We are unable to perceive the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Bishop of Rome, or other powerful religious leaders behind every public acknowledgment of the religious heritage long officially recognized by the three constitutional branches of government. Any notion that these symbols pose a real danger of establishment of a state church is farfetched indeed.
Y
That this Court has been alert to the constitutionally expressed opposition to the establishment of religion is shown in numerous holdings striking down statutes or programs as violative of the Establishment Clause. See, e. g., Illinois ex rel. McCollum v. Board of Education, 333 U. S. 203 (1948); Epperson v. Arkansas, 393 U. S. 97 (1968); Lemon v. Kurtzman, supra; Levitt v. Committee for Public Education & Religious Liberty, 413 U. S. 472 (1973); Committee [687]*687for Public Education & Religious Liberty v. Nyquist, 413 U. S. 756 (1973); Meek v. Pittenger, 421 U. S. 349 (1975); and Stone v. Graham, 449 U. S. 39 (1980). The most recent example of this careful scrutiny is found in the case invalidating a municipal ordinance granting to a church a virtual veto power over the licensing of liquor establishments near the church. Larkin v. Grendel’s Den, Inc., 459 U. S. 116 (1982). Taken together these cases abundantly demonstrate the Court’s concern to protect the genuine objectives of the Establishment Clause. It is far too late in the day to impose a crabbed reading of the Clause on the country.
VI
We hold that, notwithstanding the religious significance of the creche, the city of Pawtucket has not violated the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment.13 Accordingly, the judgment of the Court of Appeals is reversed.
It is so ordered.