Residents of the City of Glencoe, Alabama are fighting back against the Freedom From Religion Foundation after the atheist organization threatened the city over a Christian flag flying on public property.

City officials opted to remove the Christian flag in front of the police station late last month, but the decision upset many residents, about 100 of which attended a peaceful rally Saturday to waive Christian flags of all sizes and speak about the country’s religious freedoms, The Gadsden Times reports.

Glencoe’s Christian mayor, Charles Gilchrist, told those at the “United We Stand” rally in front of City Hall that the decision to remove the flag was a tough one.

“I’m not going to give these people $500,000 and lose a case so they can go fight someone else,” Gilchrist said, according to the site. “I’m just not going to do that.”

He previously told WBRC Fox 6 the decision to remove the flag was based on the projected legal costs associated with defending against a FFRF lawsuit.

“That would about ruin us … That’s what they do, they pick on these smaller towns that can’t defend ourselves,” Gilchrist said.

Also in attendance Saturday were state Rep. Mack Butler and Sen. Phil Williams, who said the real issue at stake is the religious freedoms the country was founded on.

“Butler reminded the crowd of the Christian chaplain for Congress, paid for by taxes since 1789; of the phrase ‘In God We Trust,’ printed on U.S. currency since the mid-1800s; of the service of the U.S. Capitol as a church, attended by Thomas Jefferson and each U.S. president through Abraham Lincoln,” the Times reports.

“We weren’t called to sit back and watch and not say a word, we’re called to go out and proclaim the gospel among all nations,” Williams told attendees.

The event was put on by the Etowah County Chapter of First Responders. The Christian flag had been flying in front of the police department since the late 1990s, according to WVTM 13.

Glencoe spokeswoman Tashia Blackerby told The Christian Post the FFRF’s legal threat over the Christian flag isn’t the city’s first tango with the group.

“We received letters from (FFRF). First of all, it was on our manger scene. We had a manger scene at Christmas time,” Blackerby said. “And then it was back-to-back with the Christian flag that we had flying out here in front of the police department.”

In a February letter to city officials, FFRF lawyer Andrew Seidel wrote about the flag that “the display of this patently religious symbol on City property confers government endorsement of Christianity” and it violates the establishment clause of the United States Constitution, the Post reports.

“A majority of federal courts have held displays of Latin crosses on public property to be an unconstitutional endorsement of religion,” Seidel wrote.

While Glencoe ultimately decided to remove the Christian flag, FFRF’s other victims have resisted the group’s bullying tactics.

Minnesota’s La Crescent City Council is reviewing the legality of a combination cross and star display the local Lions Club has maintained on city property for more than four decades, the La Crosse Tribune reports.

FFRF lawyers sent La Crescent Mayor Mike Poellinger a letter demanding the city remove the structure because “the religious significance of the Latin cross is unambiguous and indisputable.

“The Latin cross is the principal symbol of Christianity around the world, and display of the cross alone could not reasonably taken to have any secular point,” the letter read.

The cross and star display is located within a fenced area near the city’s water reservoir. City attorney Skip Wieser advised council members last week that courts have been inconsistent in how they interpret the U.S. Constitution’s Establishment Clause, which spells out the separation of church and state.

“The display at a city building would be viewed in the court differently than a display at a city park, which may be viewed differently than a display at a city water reserve,” Wieser said, according to the Tribune.

City officials plan to research the issue further to determine factors that would likely be important if FFRF sues over the display, such as who constructed it and purpose behind it, as well as whether public dollars were spent.

“We’re not going to just roll over,” councilor Bernie Buehler said.

Meanwhile, Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice Roy Moore is organizing an “Awake America” rally against the flag removal in Glencoe for Aug. 16 at 6:30 p.m. at Wallace Hall, the Times reports.