IS AMERICA A CHRISTIAN NATION?

I sent this to obama last summer but it is still pertinent. I hope it enlightens you.

Mr. Obama,                                                                                                        July 4, 2010

As American citizens, we take exception your statement to the world that America is not a Christian nation but, instead, the largest muslim nation in the world.   It seems that you are ill-informed.   Please allow us to correct the defects in your education.  Let us start by noting that the USA has 4% of the world’s population and 6% of the world’s land mass.  These are rather paltry and unimpressive facts by themselves.   These facts become quite staggering, however, when you add in the fact that, We the People, account for 24% of the world’s economy.  Do you know that most of the 192 nations in the UN last only 20 – 30 years between revolutions?  How has our nation survived and prospered for over 230 years as a government of the People, by the People, and for the People?  Why does this little speck of earth do so well when others don’t?  How did we get here without a king or dictator? Why has France had 7 different styles of government and Italy 51 since 1776 and we only have 1?

 Why is our nation so prosperous?  Could it be that our founding fathers based our government on biblical principles, in line with the will of God, and looked to Him for every decision they made?  In the opening paragraph of the Declaration of Independence, our founders invoked the “Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God” in reference to the station to which we are entitled to by God. The next paragraph says that we are “endowed by our Creator (not our government) with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness”.  It goes on to state that “governments are instituted among men and derive their just powers from the consent of the governed”, We the People.  The Declaration closes with “And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our fortunes, and our sacred Honor.  Divine providence and sacred honor, sounds to us like they were asking God’s blessing on what they were doing.   At the end of the Declaration, they wrote “In the Year of Our Lord, 1787”.  That doesn’t sound very non-Christian to me.  As Christians we know one can’t ask for blessings from a God one doesn’t believe in.

Where did our Constitution and our way of life come from?  How did our founding fathers get to the point of writing our Declaration of Independence and the Constitution?  Where did they get the crazy ideas that led America to be the shining light of the world for 230 years?  What were the backgrounds of the 56 signers of the Declaration of Independence and why were they so against “God in public life”?  Truth is, they weren’t against public Christianity at all, in fact, they were for it.

Settlers came to the “New World” to escape religious persecution in Europe.  The Church of England, in effect, the king of England, ruled Britain with an iron fist, as did the Catholic Church, ruled by the Pope, in Continental Europe.  People came here with very little more than a desire to worship God, not a worldly ruler.

Before they came ashore, the Pilgrims wrote the Mayflower Compact.  It starts “In the Name of God, Amen”.  Their first act upon landing was to build a giant cross and kneel before it in prayer, thanking God for their safe journey in a perilous time and across a perilous ocean.  Didn’t learn that in school did you?  Do you know, Mr. President, the first settlers tried socialism and almost starved, and that when they divided the land and made each family responsible for themselves, as God ordained in the bible, society prospered?  Do you know that the first schools were set up by churches, using the bible as a main part of reading comprehension, spelling, and history, being taught in many cases by members of clergy and their families?  Many a minister’s wife spent her entire adult life teaching children from the bible.  This culture bore the men who would write two of the greatest documents ever written, The Declaration of Independence and The Constitution of the United States.

Christian or not, that is the question.  John Jay, the first Supreme Court Chief Justice was the head of The American Bible Society, Thomas Jefferson, a hero of the “founding fathers were atheists” crowd, was also the founding father of the Virginia Bible Society.  He also wrote that God is the source of all freedom.  Jefferson also started many Christian schools to educate the black population who were, ironically, denied an education in public schools.  Benjamin Franklin, another favorite of the anti-Christian nation crowd, during an impasse in the writing of the Declaration, on June 28 asked the writers to stop and pray for God’s intervention and guidance.  In 1786, Jefferson wrote in a bill to de-establish the Church of Virginia, “Almighty God hath created the mind free and all attempts to influence it by temporal punishments are a departure from the plan of the holy author of our religion, who being Lord both of body and mind, yet choose not to propagate it by coercions on either, as was in his Almighty power to do, but to exalt it by its influence on reason alone”.   Jefferson also attended weekly church services in the House of Representatives.  Non-Christian?  Separation of church and state?  You would think he would understand the First Amendment.

 In the first Thanksgiving Proclamation, President George Washington stated that “it is the duty of all nations to acknowledge God, obey His will, be grateful for his benefits, and humbly implore His protection and favor”.  Washington also called for a day of prayer to acknowledge God and give Him thanks for the victory over tyranny.  Rev. Dr. John Witherspoon, another signer of the Declaration of Independence and president of Princeton University, taught a biblical understanding of government.  In a 1776 sermon, he said,”if your cause is just- you may look with confidence to the Lord and entreat Him to plead it as his own”.  He also compared the coming struggle to that of David and Goliath.

Twenty-four of the fifty-six signers of the Declaration of Independence were seminary trained and many were active ministers at the time.  Sounds like they believed in the same Christian principles we have been taught since birth.  And James Madison, considered to be the father of the Constitution and author of the First Amendment, was greatly influenced by the bible.  He believed man was a fallen creature and could only progress with the help of God.  He also called, twice, for a national day of prayer, and once called for a national day of fasting. 

The first meeting of the Continental Congress was on September 7, 1784.  It opened with a 3 hour prayer and bible study.  They read Psalm 35 and prayed.  John Adams was so affected by this action that he wrote his wife and asked her to encourage people to read and pray over Psalm 35.  He stated that God spoke clearly to the gathered delegates and they believed that through the guidance of God that they could win their freedom.  The Treaty of Paris, signed in 1783 as the surrender document by England starts with “In the Name of the Holy and Undivided Trinity”.  George Washington, upon his inauguration, kissed the bible on which he swore his oath and then took it to a two hour church service at St. Paul’s Cathedral to give thanks to God Almighty.

Did you know, Mr. President, that abortion was illegal in colonial America?  Virginia forbade abortions for any reason, with Thomas Jefferson stating that life comes from God, not parents.  Sounds like Thomas Jefferson disagreed with your thoughts on the matter.  Early law books in America often quoted Psalm 139, dealing with pregnancy and birth.  Verse 13 says “For you formed my inward parts; you covered me in my mother’s womb”.  Sounds like Christian values of life at conception to me.  Can you explain to me why embryonic stem cell research has come up with nothing after 30 years of research while adult stem cell research, not requiring death, has provided us with cures to 85 health issues in the few short years it has been worked on?  Could this be God blessing what is pleasing to Him and cursing that which is not pleasing?

Do you know where the practice of “drumming someone out of the military” comes from?  It was Gen. George Washington’s answer to homosexuality in the military.  The soldiers would make two lines and the involved parties would be stripped of their uniform insignias and marched between the lines, with drummers following, to the gates of the fort or encampment.  The purpose was to publicly humiliate those involved.  Sounds like George Washington disagreed with your stated policy on the matter. 

Are you familiar with the “Treatises of Government” by John Locke, published in 1690? Based on original documents, written by our founding fathers and in the possession of David Barton of WallBuilders, this is the basis for the Declaration of Independence.  Not too impressive, I guess.  But, do you know that the bible is quoted or referred to 12 times as often by our founding fathers?

The “separation of church and state” has been perverted from the founding fathers’ intention.  At the time of the writing of the Constitution, several states had churches established by the state.  The purpose of the First Amendment was to prevent the federal government from interfering with the way people in a state chose to worship.  “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion” says the First Amendment.  Government has done a great job of not establishing a government church, but there is more to the amendment than that.  The problems arise when judges decide that We the People of the Christian faith can no longer have manger scenes set up on public property, We the People of the Christian faith cannot have crosses as part of a city or state seal, We the People of the Christian faith can no longer pray or read our bibles in public, or have our children taught moral right and wrong in school, We the People cannot have our children see the Ten Commandments in school buildings because it might affect them.  Where in the First Amendment does it say the ACLU can tell my town where we can and can’t express our faith in Jesus Christ?  The First Amendment continues with”or prohibiting the free exercise thereof”.    The term ‘wall of separation” actually came when Thomas Jefferson, as President, answered a letter from the Danbury, Connecticut Baptist Association in concerns for their freedom of religion.  They were concerned that the government could prevent them from worshipping and Jefferson wrote back that the “wall of separation between church and state” prevented the federal government from interfering in their worship. That seems pretty transparent to me.  The “no public worship” crowd took 8 words of a letter, out of context, and made it the law of the land.  It is really sad when Minneapolis airport spends millions of tax dollars to build a foot wash for muslims but denies Christians the right to have their privately funded Christmas symbols in that same airport.  Public funding for muslim religious customs is okay, private funding for Christian customs is unconstitutional, and therefore, not allowed.  Religious Freedom or equal access under the law?  No, I don’t think so. 

Not a Christian nation.  Have you heard the story of Brig. Gen. Robinson Risner, a resident of the infamous Hanoi Hilton of Vietnam?  He tells the story of what he endured at the hands of the North Vietnamese and how his faith in God and his love of America got him through 7 years of torture and deprivation.  Have you heard of Dallas Plemmons, captured by Chinese soldiers when they intervened in Korea?  He tells of his torture and eventual escape during a death march.  He tumbled down into a ravine, hoping to somehow escape, with other soldiers following and landing on top of him.  When the Chinese were done firing into the ravine, he was the only one left alive.  Soaked in blood, temperatures 20 degrees below zero and him many miles inside China, he tells of kneeling and asking God what to do.  “I don’t know what to do God” he says.  He immediately felt a warmth and presence that cleared his mind and he began to climb out of the ravine and make his way back down the road he had just traveled.  He tells of topping a mountain and seeing the Yalu River below, the border between China and North Korea.  Beyond the river lay a snow covered mountain range he had been defending when his unit was overrun by the Chinese and he was captured.  He lay there and said”God, how am I going to cross the river?  How can I get through those mountains?”  The next thing he remembers is being across the river and past those mountains, within earshot of 155 mm howitzers of the United States military.  Not a Christian nation, Mr. President?  What else do you call these men and what they represent?  These are heroes who don’t take credit for anything, but look to God and their Christian faith as their deliverer from death and pain. 

Mr. Obama, please read the following quotes and tell me our founding fathers and past presidents weren’t Christians:

Founding Father and U. S. Supreme Court Chief Justice John Marshall said: The general principles on which the fathers achieved independence were. . . . the general principles of Christianity. ¹³

 JOHN ADAMS
[T]he teachings of the Bible are so interwoven and entwined with our whole civic and social life that it would be literally….impossible for us to figure to ourselves what that life would be if these teaching were removed. ¹⁴

TEDDY ROOSEVELT
America was born a Christian nation – America was born to exemplify that devotion to the elements of righteousness which are derived from the revelations of Holy Scripture. ¹⁵

WOODROW WILSON
American life is built, and can alone survive, upon . . . [the] fundamental philosophy announced by the Savior nineteen centuries ago. ¹⁶

HERBERT HOOVER
This is a Christian Nation. ¹⁷

HARRY TRUMAN
Let us remember that as a Christian nation . . . we have a charge and a destiny. ¹⁸

 RICHARD NIXON [W]ith us, Christianity and religion are identified. It would be strange, indeed, if with such a people our institutions did not presuppose Christianity and did not often refer to it and exhibit relations with it.

Since the bible and prayer were removed from public schools in 1962 and ‘63, there has been a 694% increase in crime, and increases in teen pregnancy and STDs.  Not a coincidence to me.  When I was in school, graduating in 1968, the biggest problems were spit wads and stink bombs.  Now we have rampant drug use, pregnancy, and violence.  State prisons with secular rehabilitation programs have a 68% recidivism rate while states with faith based programs have a 20% recidivism rate.  That tells me something, does it speak to you?

Our nation faces a peril greater than muslim terrorists, greater than any foreign enemy.  We face an enemy within.  The ACLU and like minded groups are destroying the bedrock of our society and you can see the results.  Our crime rates have gone up, our economy has gone down, and we are adrift in a sea of relativism and humanism.  We don’t need the government establishing a religion, what we need is for the government to merely acknowledge God and His influence on our nation, past, present, and future, and leave Christians alone to worship when and where we wish. That doesn’t seem too much to ask, equal opportunity under the law.  We only ask for the same tolerance given to muslims, Jews, agnostics, atheists, etc.  There doesn’t seem to be any room in the tolerance boat for those who first exercised tolerance. Christians are not tolerated in today’s society and God will judge this nation harshly if that is not changed.

Go back and study the founding fathers.  See what they said and what they wrote.  Look at Supreme Court decisions from those days and see how far we have gone wrong.  Our founding fathers wrote the First Amendment to prevent denominational rule (i.e. Baptists, Methodists, Lutherans, etc), that one group would not be able to set their dogma as the only dogma allowed.  None of these great men would approve of today’s court decisions and they way this country is being ruled rather than governed.

Godly principles made this country great and falling away from those principles has us falling as a nation.  We submit this as a testament to the faith our founding fathers had in God Almighty and Jesus Christ as the way, the truth, and the light.  This nation will once again be great because We the People have that faith of our fore fathers. With you or without you, We the People will prevail because We the People look to God Almighty as the true leader of this nation.  Without Him, we cannot survive.

We submit this in the name of the Most Holy Trinity, in faith, with the responsibility give us by Almighty God to honor His work and not let it die from neglect.

Bob Russell                                         Marsha Russell

423 N. Choctaw, Claremore, Oklahoma  74017-7246