Pretty good message I just read in light of our 250th Anniversary. Also noting as we pass or have passed our own personal 50th Anniversaries, it occurred to me that we are only 5 such generations like that, 5 x 50 = 250 years, separated from these great events. I also remember celebrating our 200th, back when I lived in Boston. Time passes fast. But it has not been that long.
I was particularly struck by the John Adams words below(highlight added):
Now, that understanding of “happiness” makes a huge difference, doesn’t it? Individual and rather shallow “happiness” cannot be rightfully pursued at the expense of the greater good of all. John Adams presents a great example of the view of many of the signers and their tie between their faith and politics. According to the Faith of Our Fathers website:
On April 18, 1775, a British soldier ordered him, John Hancock, and others to “disperse in the name of George the Sovereign King of England. Adams responded to him:
“We recognize no sovereign but God, and no king but Jesus!”4
After the signing of the U.S. Constitution, in an October 13, 1789 address to the military, Adams said:
“We have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion. Avarice, ambition, revenge, or gallantry would break the strongest cords of our Constitution as a whale goes through a net. Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”
In a letter to Thomas Jefferson dated June 28, 1813, he said
“The general principles on which the fathers achieved independence were the general principles of Christianity”5
Independence Day: Political or Religious?
Rainbow Trout 