Dare To Ask Talk And News About Our Differences
Andrew Johnson said: ‘Let us look forward to the time when we can take the flag of our country and nail it below the Cross, and there let it wave as it waved in the olden times, and let us gather around it and inscribe for our motto: ‘Liberty and Union, one and inseparable, now and forever,’ and exclaim, ‘Christ first, our country next!’ James Madison, in the 1785 session of the General Assembly of the State of Virginia, explained why he was against the Establishment of Religion by Law: ‘Because the policy of the bill is adverse to the diffusion of the light of Christianity. The first wish of those who ought to enjoy this precious gift, out to be, that it may be imparted to the whole race of mankind.’ Zachary Taylor, in acknowledging the receipt of a beautifully bound Bible and a copy of the U.S. Constitution, sent a message that was printed in the Frankfort Commonwealth, Feb. 21, 1849: ‘I accept with gratitude and pleasure your gift of this inestimable Volume. It was for the love of the truths of this great Book that our fathers abandoned their native shores for the wilderness. Animated by its lofty principles they toiled and suffered till the desert blossomed as a rose. The same thruths sustained them in their resolutions to become a free nation; and guided by the wisdom of this Book they founded a government under which we have grown from three million to more than twenty millions of people..’ There are so many quotes from George Washington that express his faith, it is hard to choose. But here are a few from his personal prayer book. ‘O most Glorious God, in Jesus Christ my merciful and loving Father, I acknowledge and confess my guilt, in the weak and imperfect performance of the duties of this day. I have called on Thee for pardon and forgiveness of sins…’ ‘…remove my sins from Thy presence, as far as the east is from the west, and accept of me for the merits of Thy son Jesus Christ, that when I come into Thy temple and compass Thine alter, my prayer may come before Thee as incense…’ ‘Bless O Lord the whole race of mankind, and let the world be filled with the knowledge of Thee and Thy Son, Jesus Christ…’