HILLSBOROUGH, California (LifeSiteNews) — California’s removal of a statue of St. Junipero Serra that has towered over Highway 280 in Hillsborough since 1976 has sparked anger from Christians.

“California is quietly removing statues of saints and of Christian importance across the state,” Matt Wallace pointed out Wednesday. He decried the statue’s removal as “an attack on all of us,” adding, “We must stand United against evil. BRING BACK THE STATUE!!!

The state’s Department of Transportation, CalTrans, said it tore down the statue of the revered missionary “because the installation did not meet current Transportation Art Program requirements and had been a frequent target of graffiti and vandalism.”

However, CalTrans admitted to consulting with an indigenous peoples’ group before the statue’s removal, according to Newsweek, and told the National Catholic Register that it “solicited input from multiple historical, arts and religious organizations.”

Conservative commentators and Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone decried the removal of the monument to St. Serra, a Spanish Franciscan missionary to the U.S. who helped to found nine missions in California in the late 18th century. 

“No one fought for St. Junípero Serra because, apparently, officials from Caltrans and the Transportation Art Program didn’t consult with anyone who would give them an opinion that differed from their own,” Cordileone told the National Catholic Register. “Once again, Catholics are subject to prejudice and marginalization.”

Author Janie Johnson protested the statue’s removal as an “attack on Christianity.” “He helped and serviced the poor! Bring back our Saints!” Johnson exclaimed on X.

LifeSiteNews reached out to CalTrans for further information on the reasons behind its removal but has not heard back as of publishing.

Vandalism of St. Junipero Serra statues has become common as leftists have become inflamed with anger over what they perceive as his role in the “destruction” of native culture. This particular statue was sprayed in 2020 with graffiti reading “monument of genocide.”

Other statues of St. Serra have been destroyed or removed across California and the U.S. In 2020, the city of Ventura ripped down a statue of St. Serra after a unanimous vote to remove both the bronze statue from in front of city hall and the identical wooden statue from inside the building, ceding to clamor that Father Serra was “Father genocide.”

In Hillsborough, a native peoples’ group had reportedly been seeking to remove the statue for years. The Association of Ramaytush Ohlone, the indigenous people of the San Francisco Peninsula, in 2020 wrote a letter to CalTrans demanding the removal of the statue because it “violates the separation of Church and State” and it “honors the founder of the California missions that destroyed Native peoples and cultures.”

“Serra was an evangelist and a colonizer,” the letter read, adding, “There is nothing to celebrate here. No person should be honored for their direct participation in the destruction of an entire people and their culture.”

The letter appears to have played a role in the statue’s removal. District 4 public information officer Jeneane Crawford told Newsweek that “local Ohlone tribes, who have ancestral ties to the land in San Mateo County, were consulted.”

While Serra is widely derided by the left for what they see as his “harm” to indigenous people, Archbishop Cordileone has insisted that the saint was a champion and protector of indigenous people.

“St. Serra made heroic sacrifices to protect the indigenous people of California from their Spanish conquerors, especially the soldiers,” Cordileone said after another statue of Serra in San Francisco was destroyed in 2020.

“Even with his infirmed leg which caused him such pain, he walked all the way to Mexico City to obtain special faculties of governance from the Viceroy of Spain in order to discipline the military who were abusing the Indians. And then he walked back to California,” Archbishop Cordileone said.

The statue is already missed, according to Patricia Gonzalez, who has worked at the Crystal Springs rest stop “for many years” and says visitors are shocked to see it gone. 

“People still come every day from all over the world” to see the statue, she told ABC7 News. “The last person that came was from Ireland. They brought some relatives to see the statue, and it was gone.”

St. Junipero Serra was canonized by Pope Francis in 2015.