Those banners contained phrases such as "In God We Trust" (the official motto of the United States); "One Nation Under God" (a phrase from the Pledge of Allegiance); "God Bless America" (the title of a patriotic song); "God Shed His Grace On Thee" (a line from a popular patriotic song)



all things that were instituted or at the height of their popularity in the 1950's. and "in god we trust" is not "the official motto" but a national motto. the 1st of those was "e pluribus unum" which was made the national motto in 1782. you imply that these slogans have something to do with the founding of our country, and they don't. maybe it's that misbelief that has others upset. none of those phrases were around when our country was founded. and that song was generations away from being written



and bringing up lines from god bless America reminded me of my favorite song of patriotism...by Woody Guthrie...that was, in fact, a response to Berlin's song...



THIS LAND IS YOUR LAND
words and music by Woody Guthrie

Chorus:
This land is your land, this land is my land
From California, to the New York Island
From the redwood forest, to the gulf stream waters
This land was made for you and me

As I was walking a ribbon of highway
I saw above me an endless skyway
I saw below me a golden valley
This land was made for you and me

Chorus

I've roamed and rambled and I've followed my footsteps
To the sparkling sands of her diamond deserts
And all around me a voice was sounding
This land was made for you and me

Chorus

The sun comes shining as I was strolling
The wheat fields waving and the dust clouds rolling
The fog was lifting a voice come chanting
This land was made for you and me

Chorus

As I was walkin' - I saw a sign there
And that sign said - no tress passin'
But on the other side .... it didn't say nothin!
Now that side was made for you and me!

Chorus

In the squares of the city - In the shadow of the steeple
Near the relief office - I see my people
And some are grumblin' and some are wonderin'
If this land's still made for you and me.

Chorus (2x)

you imply that these slogans have something to do with the founding of our country, and they don't. maybe it's that misbelief that has others upset. none of those phrases were around when our country was founded.

Some little known facts about our beginnings:

One of the first things done in Jamestown (if not the first thing) was a cross was erected in 1607 (400 yrs ago) Every single town in our country was first started with the building of a church and a minister that was paid by the state revenues. So much for separation of church and state.

97% of the founding fathers were practicing Christians and exercised their faith in public office, at work, at home, and had it taught to their children in their schools. Most homes had no other book than a bible in them.

187 of the first 200 colleges in America were Christian, Bible teaching institutions. Entrance to Harvard required strong knowledge of the Bible. Both Princeton and Harvard started out as seminaries.

Noah Webster wrote the dictionary with Bible verses explained so children could understand the words of God and know the truth of Jesus Christ. Webster even wrote a translation of the Bible for the American speaking people. The early primers were all Bible inspired. Basically our children learned to first read from the bible.

The New England Primer was the first textbook in America for more than a century. Young men and women in America learned to read and to write and just about everything else from the New England Primer. It was first published in 1690. It was the major textbook for a hundred years.

The first words of the New England Primer. Page one, sentence one: "How glorious is our Heavenly King, who reigns above the sky; How shall a child presume to sing His dreadful majesty?" .

The New England Primer taught children how to read. It taught them moral and ethical values that came directly out of the Bible.

You could hardly find a school in America that wasn't Christian based with the Bible as its main text book until the 1830's. As a result of the attack upon children learning the truths of God and Salvation, the American Sunday School League was formed during that same decade so those children who were deprived could still get Bible knowledge. I believe this was in 1791. I had a bible study tonight with a woman in her early 80's. She said every day they read scripture in schools. Where was separation of church and state then?

the Bible influenced everything in our society. For example, over the years American names have largely been biblical names. You get names like John and Mary and Jeremiah and Abigail and Josiah and Peter and Sarah, Anna and Isaiah, Samuel, Paul and Elizabeth etc.

Think about the towns that Americans lived in. In PA we have such towns as Bethlehem and Nazareth and Emmaus and Bethsaida and Shiloh and Bethel and Eden and Ephrathah and Zionsville and New Jerusalem. All these towns were named Bible names because the settlers that came there were so influenced by the Bible.

In Texas, you can find Palestine. You can find Hebron. You can find Eden, Joshua, Temple, Bishop, Blessing, Corpus Christi. All of these are biblical names in Texas.

Even in California there's Antioch and Carmel and Goshen and Bethel Island and Joshua Tree and Temple City. Again and again and again, the influence of the Bible, even in the way we named the places we lived, is significant in Old America. The Bible was the standard of thinking in Old America. I know there's a Goshen in VA because I know one who lives there.

The Declaration of Independence appeals to God no less than three times. Four to those who can see His Name in the phrase "protection of divine providence". Five to those who can admit the phrase "created equal" means created by God, not evolved from chaos.

The Declaration of Independence is the key document in the founding of the United States of America. That declaration is founded on the Bible. In fact, almost half of the signers of the Declaration of Independence--24 of the 56--were graduates of seminaries or Bible schools or they taught in seminaries or Bible schools. Of the 56 signers of the Declaration of Independence, all but two or three of them were Christians, read their Bible every day, and lived their Bible out in the way they lived their lives. One of them founded the American Bible Society.

Thomas Jefferson, one of our least religious founders, may have written the Declaration for his fine writing ability, but he was part of a 5-man committee, and it was heavily influenced by the bible. If God can use a donkey to speak his words, I guess he can use a deist .

who did that poll?







in examples like these, you neglect to recognize the fact that there was very little in the way of anything but the bible being available to many people. it's not like these guys had a choice in many occasions. we had no mass print operations. it's not like they could go to amazon.com and choose from a host of texts. the bible, in many cases , was the most commonly available book. not only because of speed, but because of resources. the bible simply dwarfed every other publication before mass print was available to the masses at a reasonable cost.

up until recently, most leaders discouraged literacy. literacy was a dictator's or monarch's enemy. thus,most states really ever encouraged the art of creative writing for the people. that left only the bible, in most cases as the only source to learn from.

and in aincient jewish times, religious scrolls and scriptures were used to teach...because that's what they had!

if the only thing i had to teach was a comic book, i'd use it. not because i believe every word, because that is what would be available, and one works with what they got.

i have no problem with someone defending religious teaching on it's own merit. but this is just a strawman argument.



ummm,,,making a creation vs. evolution argument now?

hint: darwin wasn't even born when the declaration was written

are you suggesting that the founding fathers were prophets of God and received some sort of "divine intervention" that casued them to discount evolution before the theory had even been conceived?

nonsense.

Just some comments Sean to your posting.

First of all we know the Guttenburg Press was invented in the 1400's. The Pilgrims landed over here in the 1600's. Yes, everyone had a bible and it was most likely the only book in the home for some or most. But com'on Harvard and Princeton surely had more books than just the bible available to them.

The Iliad and the Odyssey by Homer were written way before that (8th Century BC) and the Guttenburg Press after printing the bible surely printed that up as well wouldn't you think? Before the press there was block printing so while the availablity of books was not like anything we have now in the least there were books out there.

Thomas Jefferson had a great library of books as did ALL the founding fathers. It wasn't just the bible but yet many of our founding documents were based out of scripture including the Declaration. Noah Webster could have used anything else he wished but instead used bible verses in his instruction as I mentioned. Why didn't he use some of the Greek Philosophies that were so prevalent?

The New England Primer like I said before was what the kids learned from and it came right from scripture and it was published in 1690. So there were books available.

Five to those who can admit the phrase "created equal" means created by God, not evolved from chaos. ummm,,,making a creation vs. evolution argument now? hint: darwin wasn't even born when the declaration was writtenare you suggesting that the founding fathers were prophets of God and received some sort of "divine intervention" that casued them to discount evolution before the theory had even been conceived?

not at all. I was just simply pointing to the fact that our best known and most important document of our History mentions God at least five times if you count the part about us beiing "created." I wasn't pulling Darwin in at all in my statement.

The fact they even used the word "created" tho shows they believed in God's Creative Powers. Again, they didn't seem to have a problem with the separation of church and state fiasco we are so grappling with today.

I do believe God was behind the writing of our founding documents as his HS was leading these men to write down what they did.I do believe that God was the power beneath our wings like I said before. Now, we are so arrogant we believe we don't need him and wish to fly solo.

We are going to fly flat on our face......that's my opinion and I do base it on scripture and history.

The problem today is no one bothers checking into the writings of yesteryear instead relying on history that has been re written so many times we don't know what's what.

George Washington himself wrote 40,000 letters in his lifetime and we have 100 volumes of his thoughts alone. That would be a good place to start. Not with some new modern book called The Godless Civilization with no footnotes or references because "we all know it's truth."

sorry, i can't share that thought. and i find it a little scary to equate our political documents with scripture.



actually jefferson's orig draft never contained the word "creator" as in "endowed by our creator." i did notice you use the word "created" and give it a very broad definition. you must know that the other words were added post jefferson and were clever enough not to say the wrong word.

as far as church / state goes...they had their controversies too. but keep in mind, that their conflict was a choice between catholisism, protestantism or atheism. the biggest controversy was over the newest emerging church, the unitarians, who don't believe in the trinity of God or the divinity of jesus. many of the founders were congregationalists who joined the unitarians over time. they wanted that freedom to convert built in to their new govt. in advance of their conversions. notice there is nothing about jesus or the holy spirit in any of the founding documents? that's cause the unitarians didn't believe in that, and didn't want it in the documents. and the "deists" like paine and jefferson were considerd radicals. the deists don't believe in the bible's divinity, but thought that there must be "something out there." but again, look at their perspective, no science, no darwin, in a world where the mentally ill were commonly thought to be demonically posessed even by non christians. they had no other explanation...there was no serious study on mental health, not for another 100 years.

but when someone added "endowed by their creator" note the word "their." they weren't talking about other faiths that were non-existant, at least in the colonies, they were talking about their differences pertaining to sects of protestantism primarily and deism. but just because they lived in a smaller world with fewer available choices and much lower understandings of the world, especially the things they couldn't see didn't make that philosophy any different than the application of it today. the actual players might be different, but the principle is identical. government should not be the steward, defender or teacher of religion. and likewise, religion should not try to dictate to govt. and attempt to have govt. mirror any particular faith. it wasn't that the founders disliked christianity, but at the same time, they feared govt. becoming the bully pulpit for their rivals particular sect, where the differences to them can be rhetorically minimized today, were like night and day to them. in other words, the difference between a presbyterian and a unitarian were like the difference between a buhdist and a southern baptist today.

the founders saw that church and state should be seperate, as jefferson noted to the baptists after writing his words that they had effectively created "a wall between church and state" in the new nation. their view was based on a philosophy, which is more applicable today than then because they didn't have such sharp contrasts as we do.

now, if you feel christianity should be our "official" religion of state...feel free to propose the legislation and take it to your representative. i personally don't. if you feel the fact that our founders had much more limited choice than we do is a good reason to "turn the clock back" to the 1950's...again, feel free. i personally feel that despite that limit on their choices, that their philosophy and over-riding principle was the right way to go in keeping our religious institutions and public ones free of the other's influence as much as possible.

one last note...acting like the bible was on some "equal level" with any or even all the other work being published is nonsense. books were considered the property of the elites and the educated. the were expensive to make and the process was slow. there were no book stores like walden's or anything. the bible literally dwarfed every other publication merely because it was the only book that the church wanted any of the non-elite class to read..if they were doing to defy the church and learn to read instead of trusting in their priest for information. in those cases, the church made sure that what you read was their stuff. it was about controlling the masses.

the elites who were weatlthy enough to afford books didn't buy em to share em. again, they were very expensive and exclusive. so, the only book available to most before the invention of MASS PRINTING, not gutenburg's press, was the bible.

Personally, I think it's UN-Patriotic to tie patriotism with religion.