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BY KATHY O’NEIL america is the providence of God Remembering the Beginning Iwas born in a country that has laid a foundation of principles based on Providence. Providence was a word that the founding fathers used for God. They looked to Him and to the Scriptures to initiate the groundwork that would endure and endure it has. In spite of all the moves the opposition has taken to neutralize its intent and strength. Due to the Providence of God, this nation is blessed. We are told in Scripture, that whoever honors God is honored by Him. It is founded on Judeo-Christian ethics, and the Constitution is unique in all the world. It is respected by other nations and, in fact, is looked upon to solve other nations unique problems. We are an honorable people who have supported the world with finances, warriors, missionaries, and even a home for the United Nations. James Madison said, “The future and success of America is not in this constitution but in the laws of God upon which this constitution is founded. The founding fathers recognized that God is the first cause of all things. They based their document on His infinite power and wisdom. We have overcome many issues on our own soil, that could have sunk most nations. There have been many attempts to fracture and discount the Constitution, but it still stands along with the Declaration of Independence which grants our people life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. The Declaration was written in direct response to the tyranny of the King of England. It is enlightening to read it. People, the world over, desire to become citizens of this great nation. Sane laws have been set up to invite them to become citizens. Citizenship is not attained by invasion. The Republic of the United States of America is designed to be an orderly form of government where the supreme power is in our elected representatives and an elected president and not a monarch. Today, with all of our conflict and disagreements, we are still a free nation. We have a duly elected president and congress. We have a Supreme Court. The balance of powers is in place. It is a privilege to be born into this great nation. It is a responsibility to maintain it by voting and running for office to uphold the Constitution. Since the beginning, there have been differences of opinion but most often with civility. Today, we need to return to civility. We will never all agree on laws and direction, but we can do so with open hearts and minds. May Providence, the God of first cause, guide and direct this country through the rough waters of politics and culture so we may continue with the writing of history of this great nation. In the 60’s we forgot our God given heritage. May we commit as a people to look back and remember why we are free. Senior staff writer, Kathy O’Neill Why the Founding Fathers Were Probably Smarter Than We Are WASHINGTON—It's important to remember that the first president, George Washington, joined a remarkable group steeped in an education and faith that helped create this free, prosperous, powerful nation. It's sad today's students aren't learning the true forces behind these founders. Trying to catch up young people on the wonderful things they don't know about our founding fathers is author Jenny Cote's passion. She said of these men, "They studied ancient civilizations, and I don't mean just like AP History and dates and facts. They studied how governments work. They studied ancient Rome, ancient Greece. They studied philosophy, how men thought." Cote wrote The Voice, the Revolution and the Key to better connect our younger generation with America's founders. "My life's purpose is to get kids excited about history and make them fall in love with it," she said. "You have to make history fun, you have to make it personal, and you have to make kids care. Well how do you make them care? You make it relevant to them." In this newest book of hers, Cote uses talking animals to help the future leaders when they're children. One is a young Benjamin Franklin reading in-depth about ancient leaders' character, virtues and vices in a book many adults might find hard to understand. "'Plutarch's Lives:' Benjamin Franklin, 11 years old, that was his favorite book. Have you read; Plutarch's Lives?; I just read it to write this book, and it's pretty complicated." Young George Washington wrote in longhand 110 principles put together by Jesuits about how to live right and be a gentleman. "What 12-year-old today do you think would take the time to have a journal and to hand-write out rules of civility and civil discourse?" Cote asked. "He wrote down these principles so he would learn them. And our founding father, the head of them all, George Washington, this was ingrained in him young." She added, "All of the founding fathers were raised to be respectful, good citizens." They Learned All About Greece, Rome, Right and Wrong In a recent commentary for CNSNews.com, Cote wrote, "Seeds of knowledge and understanding were planted in these mere children so they knew how a healthy government should operate to serve its people, and how its people should in turn conduct themselves. They studied the mistakes of mighty empires like Rome and the intellectuals of Greece, learning what went wrong. They clearly understood their God-given natural rights and their longheld rights and responsibilities as proud Englishmen. And that's why they valued freedom and liberty. They learned from history how precious freedom truly is, and how vigilant a people must remain to hang onto it." Colonial society at that time was pretty much based on the lessons and literature of Christianity, which imbued good students with morals, virtues and civility. "Children were learning their ABC's based on Bible characters," Cote said. "Learning not to take the Lord's name in vain, for example, and to love your school and respect others. They were learning all these general principles in their classrooms." BY PAUL STRAND 30 WWW.AMERICAN CHRISTIAN VOICE.COM | VOL.14 #3
hopefully the pedulum will swing back As Cote put it, "And my grandmother always said 'what goes into the first of life goes throughout all of life.'" 'There is a Just God Who Presides...' Today's public schools not only don't teach out of the Bible, they don't teach how important Christianity was to the founding fathers. Or they maybe just suggest founders like Washington were deists, believing only in a distant, uninvolved God. Yet Washington stated after surviving a battle where his coat was punctured by numerous bullets and two horses were shot dead beneath him, "I was saved by the miraculous care of Providence that saved me beyond human expectation." Patrick Henry — the man who shouted "Give me liberty or give me death" — also stated, "There is a just God who presides over the destinies of nations." As a young man, Patrick Henry was right in the middle of the First Great Awakening and the battle for greater religious liberty in the colonies. "The war for religious freedom was happening under his own roof," Cote said, explaining that Henry's father and uncle were Anglicans in Virginia's state church. "However, his mother Sarah was a bit of a rebel, and she went with this new Great Awakening dissenter movement." She would take her son to hear evangelists preach in this first national revival, the first event to unite all the colonies. Many of these preachers were illegal because they weren't part of the official state church. "Patrick Henry saw early on this struggle for religious freedom. When he grew up and became a lawyer, he had a heart for Baptist ministers. He would represent them for free when they were thrown in prison for preaching the Word of God. And he would anonymously pay their bail to get them out." How One Voice can Change the World Listening to these fiery preachers during the First Great Awakening helped form Henry into the mighty orator eventually labeled the Voice of the Revolution. His voice for freedom and stand against the high taxes of the Stamp Act helped ignite the Revolution. "A decade before we even declared independence, he was the first one to speak up against tyranny," Cote explained. She added, "That's when Sam Adams and the boys in the Sons of Liberty said, 'Look at these guys in Virginia. We need to be that bold.' So, isn't it amazing how one voice speaking up for liberty against tyranny can change the world?" Henry and Adams joined many bold leaders educated for just that moment in time. Cote said in their younger years, "They were learning who are the heroes of history, what they did right, what they did wrong. What governments worked, what governments did not. They learned mankind over time. So as they grew, they were inspired and encouraged. And they knew, 'okay this didn't work in the past. Let's make something new that we can try that's never been tried before.'" 'They Could Smell a Tyrant Coming 3,000 Miles Away' But most important of all, Cote explained, "They understood that liberty was precious. Because it had been oppressed over the centuries and they studied it. And so because they studied what worked in history, they could smell a tyrant coming 3,000 miles away. And they were ready." Still, they weren't hotheads. As King George III oppressed them more and more, they tried for peaceful solutions. Cote called it, "A decade working with the king, saying, 'Hey, let's work this out here.' And they tried diplomacy, they tried negotiation, they tried laying their case before the king and Parliament. They did all that they could do before they finally had to take drastic measures." Cote said of Thomas Jefferson, "He did say revolution is good every now and then, but done right. It doesn't mean you go right to the guns." He, too, like many of his fellow revolutionaries had studied the political and philosophical masters. Such as, Cote pointed out, "Montesqiueu, Locke: in fact Jefferson would have read many of the words that he penned and used right in our Declaration of Independence." Study the Good, the Bad and the Ugly Though she certainly admires the founders, Cote in her books doesn't shy away from their failures and shortcomings, like Patrick Henry owning slaves. "I'm showing his struggle with slavery. Like where he says, 'It is a lamentable evil. I cannot justify if. I cannot believe I'm a Christian, yet I do this. There's no excuse.'" But the author finds it horrible that schools are shying away from teaching the great and good stories of America's first decades and its founders just because of their dark side. Skipping the Founding, Revolution and Civil War "To the point where I heard recently," Cote exclaimed, "some school curriculums are going to start teaching in 1866. 'Oh, let's just skip over the whole founding of our nation. Because it's too painful.' And this is the danger in that: Santayana said 'those who don't remember their history are doomed to repeat it.'" She argued, "You need to show all the history: the good, the bad and the ugly. And, yup, the dark side of it. But don't throw away the good, because that is what we're missing here in today's culture." Along with the National Park Service, Cote holds Patriot Camps with kids and asked past students what will happen if children don't learn their nation's history. She recounted, "They said 'we'll lose our future.' And I said 'whose responsibility is it to keep telling the stories of our history?' And you know what they said? 'It's ours.' So, if kids are willing to own it, let's just teach it to them." AlphaGriddle Solution from page 37 VOL.14 #3 | WWW.AMERICAN CHRISTIAN VOICE.COM 31
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