good old-fashioned americans

Where have they all gone? Earlier I was reading about the snafu with Juan Williams, NPR and FOX News. That whole debacle is just another indication that the good old USA is looking more and more like a bad new USA, where freedom of speech (along with many other freedoms) is going by the wayside. Mason and I just sent out our absentee ballots, hoping and praying that new blood in government will result from this election and will somehow turn the country onto a different path, a path that really respects LIFE, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. I'm not particularly interested in politics, nor do I have the aptitude to discuss its fine workings and retain detailed information about government works. But I do pray for our leaders, the ones for which I voted and the ones for which I did not. Today I also stumbled on some interesting words from past prominent Americans about the Bible, words that would probably (wrongfully and unfortunately) get them in major trouble today. The rare individual who pops up on the ballot still daring to say things like this merits my vote.

"Here is a Book worth more than all the other books which were ever printed." Patrick Henry

"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." Patrick Henry

"That book, Sir, is the Rock upon which our republic rests." Andrew Jackson

"The more profoundly we study this wonderful Book, and the more closely we observe its divine precepts, the better citizens we will become and the higher will be our destiny as a nation." William McKinley

"The best religion the world has ever known is the religion of the Bible. It builds up all that is good." Rutherford B. Hayes

"There are a good many problems before the American people today, and before me as President, but I expect to find the solution of those problems just in the proportion that I am faithful in the study of the Word of God." Woodrow Wilson

"The whole inspiration of our civilization springs from the teachings of Christ and the lessons of the prophets. To read the Bible for these fundamentals is a necessity of American life." Herbert Hoover

"I say to you, Search the Scriptures! The Bible is the book of all others, to be read at all ages, and in all conditions of human life; not to be read once or twice or thrice through, and then laid aside, but to be read in small portions of one or two chapters every day, and never to be intermitted, unless by some overruling necessity." John Quincy Adams

"We cannot read the history of our rise and development as a nation, without reckoning the place the Bible has occupied in shaping the advances of the Republic." Franklin D. Roosevelt

"Within the covers of the Bible are all the answers for all the problems men face. The Bible can touch hearts, order minds and refresh souls." Ronald Reagan

"In all my perplexities and distresses, the Bible has never failed to give me light and strength." Robert E. Lee

"We recognize no sovereign but God, and no King but Jesus."
- John Adams and John Hancock

...and quite a long list from just John Adams:

"The Declaration of Independence laid the cornerstone of human government upon the first precepts of Christianity."

"The general principles on which the fathers achieved independence were the general principles of Christianity. I will avow that I then believed, and now believe, that those general principles of Christianity are as eternal and immutable as the existence and attributes of God."

"The highest glory of the American Revolution was this: it connected, in one indissoluble bond, the principles of civil government with the principles of Christianity."

"Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other."

"I have examined all religions, and the result is that the Bible is the best book in the world."

"The Christian religion is, above all the religions that ever prevailed or existed in ancient or modern times, the religion of wisdom, virtue, equity and humanity."
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"The foundations of our society and our government rest so much on the teachings of the Bible that it would be difficult to support them if faith in these teachings would cease to be practically universal in our country.”
- Calvin Coolidge

"The fundamental basis of this Nation's law was given to Moses on the Mount. The fundamental basis of our Bill of Rights comes from the teachings which we get from Exodus and St. Matthew, from Isaiah and St. Paul."
- Harry S. Truman

"I believe that the next half century will determine if we will advance the cause of Christian civilization or revert to the horrors of brutal paganism."
- Theodore Roosevelt, President

"America was born a Christian nation".
- Woodrow Wilson, President

"This is a Christian nation."
- Harry Truman, President

"[The United States is] founded on the principles of Christianity."
- Franklin D. Roosevelt, President

I could go on. I'm encouraged to read these faithful, historical statements, and I long to hear them from our current leaders. Lord, could you bring some of these guys back from the dead for just a day or two to re-instill some sense in our leaders?