-Caveat Lector- Rediscovering Independence Day http://www.afa.net/church/rjr070401.asp Rev. R. J. Rooney Senior Pastor, Verona (MS) UMC July 4, 2001 Every year around Independence Day I pull out many of my old college texts pertaining to the American Revolution just to keep the facts fresh in my mind. With all the lamenting and wailing the humanists and atheists and religious pluralists do every time we have a national holiday (like the Fourth of July, Thanksgiving, and Christmas) I want to make sure that I remember what the facts really are. Despite their best efforts to revise and rewrite American history (everybody was a Deist and everyone came to America to escape religion) there is a pleasant revival of interest in American history. As a matter of fact it may be because of their ceaseless efforts to change history that millions of Americans are rediscovering our heritage as a Christian nation. A Christian nation. That is the phrase that drives the liberals mad. That is the concept that infuriates them all. It is infuriating because it is true. Primary source documents will simply not allow humanists or atheists to declare with any kind of intellectual integrity that our Founding Fathers were either unreligious or irreligious. I will concede, however, that it is up for debate as to whether or not America shall remain a Christian nation. Liberals have just as much an opportunity to change the course of the American way of life as Conservatives and Evangelicals have of preserving it. Thus, we really are engaged in an all out "culture war." It is a battle for ideological supremacy. And there is a reason why accurately presenting American history has become and shall remain the principle battlefield. If all history amounted to was a depiction of events and persons as they occurred then there would be no problem. Opponents of our Christian heritage would simply acknowledge the facts but claim they have no bearing on the present or the future. History would become a moot subject and the ideological confrontations would converge solely on issues of economics and politics. But it is not and a majority of Americans are rediscovering what history really is. In his classic work "The Idea of History", R.G. Collingwood correctly defines what history is and what it does: Historical knowledge is the knowledge of what mind has done in the past, and at the same time it is the redoing of this, the perpetuation of past acts in the present...To the historian, the activities whose history he is studying are not spectacles to be watched, but experiences to be lived through his own mind (p. 218). That is exactly why proponents for a religious-free America are hell-bent on revising American history. History is not about memorizing important dates, events, and people. It is about reliving and reexperiencing not just the events themselves but the atmosphere of the times and in particular the major role Christianity played shaping the individuals and events who made history. What the average American citizen is discovering is not only the truth about American history but the reality that organizations like Americans United for Separation of Church and State and People for the American Way and the National Organization for Women and so on and so forth are not only wrong but are fraudulent, misleading, dishonorable, and unprincipled. For years preceding the American Revolution the heart of colonial debate was not simply a purely political discussion over parliamentary procedures and taxation without representation. All anyone has to do is study the primary source material to discover that the debate focused upon whether or not the King of England had abrogated his God-given authority to rule over the colonists. That Christian churches played a primary role in eighteenth century colonial life is documented fact. In the years immediately preceding the Revolution loyalist ministers preached again and again from Paul's text in Romans 13 concerning obedience to those in authority. However, the many more who favored independence called upon texts like 2 Samuel 23:3, "He that rules over men must be just, ruling in the fear of God." Even reigning monarchs were viewed as being under a greater authority and responsible for and answerable to the people. When they behaved as James II they were to be declared as renegades and tyrants. The point is that the heart of colonial debate was Christian theology. When a majority of colonists embraced the view that when the King of England had imposed both the Sugar Act and Stamp Act upon them without their consent and without being fairly represented in Parliament and threatened to impose the Church of England upon them they believed he had abandoned the Biblical principles that gave him authority and revolted against him. It may very well be the case that today's liberals are afraid that if and when a majority of Americans rediscover and relive the truth of our history they too will rise up against those in positions of academic prestige and influence and those in political power and declare that we will no longer tolerate the ungodly and tyrannical (not to mention unmeritorious) laws and judicial decisions that are designed to silence Christians and attempt to remove Christianity from its historical role as the conscience of America. Historian Robert Brown noted, "Neither can religious democracy be ignored as a factor in the Revolution." The culture war is not just about ideology and politics. It is about religion in general and Christianity in particular. It was then. It is now. Slowly but surely the American public is rediscovering its Christian heritage and opening its eyes to the intellectual idiocy and political assault on its historical legacy of being a Christian nation. Perhaps the end of liberal lunacy is slowly coming into focus with each Independence Day celebration that is observed in the 21st century. -end article- ------------------ -tHE eXTREMIST History will also afford the frequent opportunities of showing the necessity of a public religion, from its usefulness to the public; the advantage of a religious character among private persons; the mischiefs of superstition, &c. and the excellency of the Christian religion above all others, ancient or modern. -Ben Franklin <A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/";>www.ctrl.org</A> DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion & informational exchange list. 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