My world view is probably not representative of the Christian world view except in its basics. However my world view is based on the Christian world view, I believe there is a Creator God. I believe that the Bible is the authoritative word of God in that it is God’s message, written through men whom He inspired, to mankind. I believe the Bible to be inerrant in its writing, i.e. it is recording what God has said and how men have reacted to it. That does not mean that every word is true as there are some lies reported, but the reporting is true. I do not believe that just any arrangement of words is true or instructive. There is the story of the preacher who paraphrased scripture by saying, “Judas went out and hanged himself.” Then he followed that statement by another scripture that said, “Go thou and do likewise.” Obviously it is absurd to put these scriptures together to say that we should go out and hang ourselves.
My world view has caused me to come to some ideas about where we are headed as a world, as a nation, and as a society. I believe that God gave us the United States of America to be a beacon of His righteousness throughout the world.* The founding fathers were at the very least men of integrity. I am on the side that says our nation’s founding fathers were godly, Christian men who were devout in their beliefs.** Some say they set up a purely secular society. My read is that they set up a society primarily for religious freedom (not freedom from religion) and rightly integrated the church in its rightful place of supporting the government, but neither slave to it nor master. The church influenced the government to rightly do what a government was ordained by God to do according to Romans 13. A democracy, rightly administered by godly, selfless servants, was the closest thing to a perfect government that there could be in the current dispensation of God’s overall plan for the world and mankind.
*I am not using “righteousness” as some moral, “I am better than you” religious term. I interpret righteousness as “rightness” or doing things right. God being the all-knowing, just and holy God that He is knows what is right above all knowledge of mankind, thus His way is the only really right way. Our challenge is to find what He is truly telling us about what His way is.
**Some would argue that many of the founding fathers were deists or something other than Christian. I would answer that the overwhelming majority were devout, orthodox Christians. Those who were deists or some more liberal version of Christianity would today be considered right-wing religious extremists, or at least fundamentalists.
4 comments:
John,
Welcome back by the way.
There is nothing in the Constitution that implies or says out right that our nation is a Christian nation. The Constitution calls on no higher power than "We the People..."
We have a Godless Secular Constitution which protects the rest of us from your "World View."
To fold Deist in with christians is incorrect. Deist believe in a benign non interested God. Not the monothiestic revealed hebrew/christian/islamic God. Do not conflate the two.
It is blatantly obvious that our constitution is built upon the Judeo-Christian principles of law. To say it is a secular constitution views it as not being congruent with the faith of the the people who drafted and lived by it. People do not need to be protected from the Christian world view. It is the Christian world view that has given us the freedoms that we experience today. People do need to be protected from the secular and athiestic world views that will lead to tyranny and oppression. The Christian world view leads to liberty and freedom.
Yes, the Diests believed in a God that was somewhat aloof. But the Diests had a closer relationship with God and even Jesus Christ than many today who totally ignore the God who is reaching out to them. The forefathers of this nation who were Diests, as only a few of them were, were more orthadox than many who claim orthodoxy today. Their words demonstrate that.
The Treaty of Tripoli as proof that we are not a Christian Nation. (http://www.stephenjaygould.org/ctrl/treaty_tripoli.html )
"Authored by American diplomat Joel Barlow in 1796, the following treaty was sent to the floor of the Senate, June 7, 1797, where it was read aloud in its entirety and unanimously approved. John Adams, having seen the treaty, signed it and proudly proclaimed it to the Nation.
Art. 11. As the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion; as it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion, or tranquillity, of Mussulmen; and, as the said States never entered into any war, or act of hostility against any Mahometan nation, it is declared by the parties, that no pretext arising from religious opinions, shall ever produce an interruption of the harmony existing between the two countries."
The fact that Barlows interpretation may have been wrong bears no relevance on the unanimous vote by the United States Senate.
Also the fact that a later version was altered to not include the statement from Article 11 is meaningless. The United States Senate read and passed unanimously the original Treaty of Tripoli of 1797. The treaty was signed by John Adams and published in major papers with no blowback from the citizens.
This does not make for "blatantly obvious" evidence that the United States is a Christian country.
One treaty does not equate to fact when there is so much evidence to the contrary, such as those of other founding fathers who not only claimed faith in God but in Jesus Christ. I would be suspect that John Adams, right or wrong, was trying to be diplomatic in his treaty and appeal to Muslims, citing the fact you pointed out that the Constitution does not mention Jesus Christ though it is definitely founded on Christian principles by Christian men. John Adams also said in speaking of the Fourth of July celebrations "It ought to be commemorated as the Day of Deliverance by solemn Acts of Devotion to God Almighty," and "Our constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate for the government of any other." Another author said, "The freedoms we've enjoyed were a byproduct of our Christian world view, as the founders well understood. It would be better if we heard what Adams and the other founders actually said: either moral and religious citizens, or eventually slaves."
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