What Kind of Country Are We?

I cringe every time I witness another decision that diminishes our country’s allegiance to God. Unfortunately, evidence of such is everywhere.

A few weeks back, I mentioned that Richard Henry Lee, the Virginia statesman who called for the colonies’ independence in the Second Continental Congress, harbored the fear that the absence of legal limits to political tenure could create an oligarchic structure, a structure that allows a ‘rule by the few’.

His fears were echoed by Thomas Jefferson who worried that the Courts would overstep their authority by ‘Making Law’ instead of ‘Interpreting Law.’ Such endeavors create an oligarthic configuration in which select individuals in power determine what is best for all of us.

That, ladies and gentlemen, is what is taking place today. A few, who think they ‘know best’, are doing all they can to herd us like sheep into various pens.

That isn’t what our Founding Fathers had in mind. What they intended is that each of us would make his own decisions based, for better or worse, upon the relationship or nonrelationship we had with our Lord.

Man should take care of himself, not the other way around.

Recently I received an email from my old high school chat group that attributed several remarks to Andy Rooney, that admirable old curmudgeon.

I couldn’t determine if he were the author of the article since many articles have been falsely attributed to him. On the other hand, it seems to me this would be his type of wry admonition to those who harbor the notion they are better than everyone else.

You cannot deny that many court judges around the country are rendering decisions that cast God from our lives, despite the undeniable fact that 235 years ago, a handful of dedicated men established a republic based upon Christianity.

Now this Christianity is not a specific faith, but an adherence to God’s basic tenets of brotherhood and love.

Our country once believed that. Honest.

For example, did you know if you stand in front of the U.S. Supreme Court building and look up at the gable of the structure, you will see a row of world’s law makers. Each one faces the one in the middle who is looking out over the country. That middle lawmaker is Moses, and he is holding the Ten Commandants.

Then as you enter the Supreme Court, the two massive oak doors have the Ten Commandments engraved on the lower portion of each door. Inside, above where the judges sit is another display of the Ten Commandments.

Just about anywhere you go in Washington, you’ll find buildings and monuments covered with verses from the Bible.

James Madison, the fourth president, “The Father of our Constitution” said, “We have staked the whole of all our political institutions upon the capacity of mankind for self-government, upon the capacity of each and all of us to govern ourselves, to control ourselves, to sustain ourselves according to the Ten Commandments of God.”

And of the fifty-five founders of the Constitution, fifty-two were members of established orthodox churches in the colonies.

Patrick Henry, a Founding Father, exclaimed, “It cannot be emphasized too strongly or too often that this great nation was founded not by religionists, but by Christians, not on religions, but on the Gospel of Jesus Christ.”

Something else you might not have known. Every session of Congress since 1777 has begun with a prayer by a paid preacher. Oh yes, and his salary has always been paid by the taxpayer.

John Jay, appointed the first Supreme Court Chief Justice in 1789, stated “Americans should select and prefer Christians as their rulers.”

We could go on and on here, but the shame of our present situation is that for over two hundred years, our country prospered as a Christian nation. Now in the last few decades, either our leaders’ spines have turned to jelly, or they’ve forgotten God, or they simply do not believe in God.

They think because they try to accommodate everyone’s wish, they are doing that which is right and moral.

I wouldn’t be surprised if ‘In God We Trust’ were taken off our coin and replaced with ‘Praise to Allah’ or ‘Viva Zapata’ or ‘Hot’cha Sweet Mama.’

That’s how ridiculous it has become.