"God Bless America"—But
Why Should He?
A commentary by Paul Kieffer
Pastor of the United Church of God congregations in Germany
Many Europeans see America as, among other things, a country of contrasts.
At times some of those contrasts cast a baffling image across the Atlantic.
Religion is a prime example. The first amendment to the United States
Constitution prohibits Congress from making any "law respecting
an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." Freedom
of religion means that the government has no business establishing an
official state religion or prohibiting its citizens from worshiping as
they see fit, a provision readily understood when one learns that some
of America's early settlers came to the New World to escape state-sanctioned
religious persecution.
So far so good.
However, the same amendment provides for freedom of speech, which has
been successfully used to defend the distribution of pornographic material
of all sorts.
The men who wrote the U.S. Constitution and the bill of rights (the
first 10 amendments to the Constitution, which spell out citizens' personal
freedoms) were believers in God. They would have been appalled—as
indeed a sizable number of Americans are today—to see their carefully
crafted documents used to defend such immoral, ungodly behavior or to
prevent the teaching of biblical creationism in public schools in favor
of an alternative religious belief system—"creationless" creation,
otherwise known as evolution.
What a baffling contrast—the same amendment is interpreted to
allow taking God's name in vain publicly, but prohibits mentioning the
Creator in public schools!
"Freedom of religion" also means that churches and church
leaders can decide what parts of the Bible they will accept or reject.
Last week's decision by the Episcopal Church to elevate an admitted practicing
homosexual to the office of bishop amounts to a rejection of 2,000 years
of Bible-based teaching about normal marriage and sexuality.
How can people—especially religious leaders—justify such
a decision? One would have to conclude that the God whom the Episcopal
Church claims to follow has changed His mind about very clear statements
recorded in the Bible about homosexuality and the qualifications of a
man for the office of bishop, or those statements were never inspired
by Him to begin with, or the church's representatives who voted for the
change view themselves as more enlightened than He. Any of these viewpoints
has profoundly disturbing implications.
It's ironically fitting that, during the same week, a federal judge
ordered Alabama's Chief Justice Roy Moore to remove a 1.5-ton stone monument
on which the Ten Commandments were engraved (along with quotes from the
country's founding documents) from the rotunda of the state justice building
in Montgomery, Alabama. His order effectively banned from public display
the foundational principles that once were considered to be the heart
and core of the United States' legal heritage.
No wonder the rest of the world is confused at America's schizophrenic
approach to religion and the God it claims to honor. On the one hand,
U.S. President George W. Bush often ends his speeches to his fellow citizens
with the words "God bless America," but the country's court
decisions deny display of what that same God says. Supposedly the stone
monument in Alabama contradicts the principle of separation of church
and state, but Mr. Bush's frequent public requests to the author of the
Ten Commandments do not.
When a visitor to the United States takes a look at its currency, he
finds the words "In God we trust" printed on its bills and
minted on its coins.
What do you suppose God thinks of this?
The country's coins and currency proclaim its supposed trust in God,
yet those same notes are used to purchase pornography and pay for more
than a million abortions a year.
Why should God heed anyone's call to bless the country that forbids
mention of His name in its schools or public life, that bans His Word
from its bookshelves?
Why should God bless a country in which a large denomination promotes
to high church office a practicing homosexual who forsook his wedding
vows, walked out on his wife and abandoned his two young daughters for
another man?
Why should He bless a country whose religious leaders and theologians
have fabricated an imaginary god who emphasizes "love" and
tolerance for all rather than adhering to the clear, long-held teachings
and instructions of the God of the Bible?
Why should God bless a country whose courts (and increasing numbers
of its citizens) have largely turned their back on the foundational principles
established by its founding fathers—principles that clearly spelled
out their belief in a Supreme Being, the God of the Bible?
Why should God bless a country whose public school systems and institutions
of higher learning are built on a curriculum that denies He exists?
Why should God bless a country that increasingly makes it clear that
it doesn't want Him around?
"God bless America," one might ask—but why should He?
(To understand where these trends are taking the United States, request
or download our free booklet The United States and
Britain in Bible Prophecy. In it you'll learn what the Bible says
about America's future, and why.) |
