IN GOD WE TRUST


Cross Publications, Savannah, Georgia, 2000.



This page describes the Christian heritage of our country, the United States of America.
Our historic documents were written with a Christian culture in place.
We have freedom and dignity as human beings because we are creatures of God.
The most common book found in American homes has always been and still is the Bible.
We need to trust in God and live in harmony with our Creator if we are to receive his blessing.

Jesus Christ is more relevant today than ever before! In a secular global community that has essentially reduced everyone to a number, Jesus through his Church and his Word seems to be the lone voice crying out for the dignity and freedom of each individual human being. We hope and pray that Jesus Christ will help us Save Our Nation.


Christopher Columbus, commissioned by King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella of Spain, set sail on August 3, 1492, determined to find a westerly passage to the riches of India. He navigated the Nina, Pinta, and Santa Maria on a new southern route to the Canary Islands before sailing westward. Reaching land on October 12, 1492, he christened the island San Salvador - Holy Savior, an island in the Bahamas, and, thinking he had reached India, named the inhabitants Indians.

The Spaniard Ponce de Leon, who had sailed with Columbus on his second voyage, was the first European to explore the mainland, discovering Florida in 1513 in his quest for the Fountain of Youth. St. Augustine, Florida became the first permanent European settlement in America in 1565, from which missionaries spread Christianity to the native American Indians. The first Mass of Thanksgiving on North American soil was actually celebrated by the Spanish with the Timucuan Indians from Seloy village in attendance on September 8, 1565 in St. Augustine; so began the first parish in the United States.

Religious freedom and the lure of economic gain were the primary reasons for migration to America. Four of the original 13 English colonies were specifically chartered for religious freedom, as a refuge from religious persecution in England at the time - William Bradford and the Pilgrim Congregationalists at Plymouth in 1620 and the Calvinist John Winthrop and the Puritan Protestants in 1629 in Massachusetts; Lord Baltimore Cecil and his brother Leonard Calvert for the Catholics in Maryland in 1632; Roger Williams and the Baptists in Providence, Rhode Island in 1644; and William Penn and the Quakers in Pennsylvania in 1682. The Mennonites also moved to Pennsylvania in 1683 at the invitation of William Penn, for Pennsylvania was established for universal religious toleration.

Early American Writings reflected this belief in God, such as the Mayflower Compact, which allowed for the first time consent by the governed; A Model of Christian Charity, the premium expression of the covenant theology of the Puritans, which warned of the dangers of seeking pleasure and profits over virtue; and The Toleration Act of Maryland for toleration of all Christian religions.

Tragically, freedom of religion often meant one had freedom of religion as long as one practiced the religion of the majority! For example, Quakers suffered persecution at the hands of the Puritans in Massachusetts, exemplified by the hanging of the Quaker Mary Dyer on June 1, 1660. The theocracy, a society where the State is ruled by the Church, of the Puritans eventually gave way to religious excess, exemplified by the Salem witch trials of 1692; the Salem witch trials led to a tension between Church and State.

However, spirituality stayed ingrained in American culture, as evidenced by Christian churches built for religious worship throughout the colonies of the Eastern seaboard. The oldest church still standing in the United States is the Protestant Old Brick Church, now known as Historic St. Luke's Church on Isle of Wight near Smithfield, Virginia, originally built in 1632. The oldest Catholic Church with continuous service is St. Ignatius Church at Chapel Point in St. Mary's County, Maryland, originally built in 1641. The oldest Church in Boston, Massachusetts, Old North Church, known as Christ Episcopal Church, was built in 1723, and played an important role in American history. On the evening of April 18, 1775, the church sexton, Robert Newman, climbed the steeple and held high two lanterns as a signal to Paul Revere that the British were heading to Lexington and Concord by sea and not by land. The oldest Church with continuous service in Washington D. C. is Holy Trinity Catholic Church in Old Georgetown, founded by the Jesuits in 1794.



Our Founding Fathers were men of religious conviction. Thomas Jefferson was a Christian Deist and believed that God created the universe, but as a clockmaker - once set in motion, it would run itself on the rational laws of nature. He believed the highest moral code for man existed in the Ten Commandments of God and the Beatitudes of Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount. In the Declaration of Independence, Thomas Jefferson believed that man received natural rights from God our Creator. "All men are created equal with certain unalienable rights, among them Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of happiness."

The Liberty Bell of Philadelphia rang out on July 8, 1776, proclaiming the first public reading of the Declaration of Independence. Inscribed on the Liberty Bell are the words from the Book of Leviticus:
"Proclaim LIBERTY throughout all the Land unto all the Inhabitants thereof - Lev. XXV:X".

The Bible was a part of colonial life, and our Constitution was written with a Christian culture in place. James Madison, the Father of the Constitution, was the leading proponent of freedom of conscience and religion. He stated: "We maintain therefore that in matters of Religion, no man's right is abridged by the institution of Civil Society, and that Religion is wholly exempt from its cognizance." He also recognized that we needed to govern ourselves by the Ten Commandments of God if we were to survive as a nation. We see this in our public life through the continuance in our oaths of office including the Presidency of the phrase, "So help me God."

The architecture of the U. S. Supreme Court building reflects this biblical foundation. For example, at the center of the sculpture over the east portico of the Supreme Court Building, there is the image of Moses holding the two tablets of the Ten Commandments; these are also engraved over the chair of the Chief Justice and on the bronze doors of the Supreme Court. The Ten Commandments of God are the foundation of the moral code and legal system of justice for Western Christian civilization.

On one hand, our founding fathers wanted to prevent a state-controlled religion, as seen under the absolute monarchies of Europe, such as the Anglican Church in England or the Holy Roman Empire throughout Europe. On the other hand, they wanted to protect religious freedom and freedom of speech, often the major reason for migration to America. This was one rationale for the First Amendment of the Bill of Rights to be included in the Constitution of the United States:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion,
or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;
or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press;
or the right of the people peaceably to assemble,
and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

The "Father" of our nation, George Washington, had a strong belief in God. When the Revolutionary War was finally won, he sent the following message to the Governors of the 13 colonies, that he would "make it my earnest prayer that God would have you, and the State over which you preside, in his holy protection." President George Washington stated it was impossible to rightly govern without God and the Bible. In his 1796 Farewell Speech following his second term as President, a speech noted for establishing and sustaining our great nation, he stated, "Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports."


Emanuel G Leutze - George Washington crossing the Delaware River, 1851, Courtesy of Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.

The idea that we place our trust in God has been integral to our heritage. It was during the British invasion of 1814 that Francis Scott Key wrote The Star-Spangled Banner. Following the 25-hour British bombardment of Fort McHenry in Baltimore on September 14, 1814, he was so moved to see the American flag still flying that he wrote the song that would become our National Anthem. Here is the conclusion of the fourth and final stanza:

Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just,
And this be our motto: "In God is our trust."
And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!

Religious currents streamed through the American continent with the expanding frontier. John Wesley of the newly-formed Methodists named Francis Asbury and Thomas Coke in 1784 as the first co-superintendents of the Methodist Church in America. Francis Asbury and the Methodist circuit-riders were effective missionaries in spreading the Christian faith in the South and expanding West during the Second Great Awakening of 1790-1835. Large numbers of African-Americans from Southern plantations began joining mainstream Christian churches, because they were allowed to attend outdoor revivals known as camp meetings, where Methodist circuit riders would arouse the religious passions of the audience. The plantation work songs of the Negro slaves became Spiritual Hymns infused with Christian themes, that often conveyed a longing for freedom and deliverance from their lives of hardship. The Revivalist Charles Finney mobilized the North in promoting abolition of slavery. Such Evangelical movements became the most influential religious activity in America, characterized by religious revivals which emphasized the need for a personal conversion to the way of our Lord Jesus Christ. The Second Great Awakening also dramatized the moral issue of slavery, which led to the American Civil War of 1861-1865.


The tragic treatment of Native Americans led to the dispossession of Indian lands, and African-American slavery was not addressed until the Civil War, which was fought for freedom, freedom for all. In a tribute to the 52,000 Americans that had been killed, injured or lost in the 3-day battle of Gettysburg, Abraham Lincoln in his 1863 Gettysburg Address declared that "this nation under God shall have a new birth of freedom - and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth." The Thirteenth through Fifteenth Amendments to the Constitution were added after the Civil War to end slavery (1865), to provide equal protection to all that were defined as citizens (1868), and to grant the vote to former slaves (1870). The belief and expression "Nation under God" preceded and later was incorporated into our Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag of the United States of America.


Abraham Lincoln appointed Salmon Chase as Secretary of the Treasury. During the Civil War, Chase wrote the US Mint on November 20, 1861 that "the trust of our people in God should be declared on our national coins." James Pollock, the Director of the Mint, first placed "God our Trust" and other phrases on coins from 1861 to 1863. The two-cent coin of 1864 was the first circulating US coin to bear the phrase In God We Trust. George T. Morgan designed the beautiful Liberty Silver Dollar series, produced from 1878 through 1904 and again in 1921; it was the first complete silver dollar set to include the inscription. Since that time, all of our coins and dollar bills have the inscription In God We Trust. In God We Trust became our national motto on July 30, 1956 under President Dwight D. Eisenhower.

The 1878 Carson City Silver Dollar depicting the inscription In God We Trust.

The Statue of Liberty, the symbol of freedom and of our nation, was given to the United States in 1884 as a gift from France as an expression of friendship. The inspiration for the Statue came from Edouard Rene Lefebvre de Laboulaye, the sculptor was Frederic Auguste Bartholdi, and the framework was designed by Alexandre Gustave Eiffel. Our Statue of Liberty stands 151 feet tall and was placed on a pedestal on Liberty Island, New York, raising the height to 305 feet. The American poet Emma Lazarus conceived the poem in 1883 which gave the Statue its eternal meaning of freedom:
"Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free..."


The Statue of Liberty, Liberty Island, New York.

And where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.
ll Corinthians 3:17

The early twentieth century saw the beginning of new religious movements. The Pentacostal movement originated in 1901 with Charles Fox Parham at Bethel Bible College in Topeka, Kansas, and gained further momentum with his student W. J. Seymour, who founded the Azusa Street Revival in Los Angeles in 1906. Biblical Fundamentalism accepted the Bible as the only necessary source of teaching about Christ. Seeking to defend the Bible from modern liberalism, a group of Christian ministers published the twelve-volume The Fundamentals: A Testimony to the Truth from 1910 to 1915. The term fundamentalist first appeared in 1920 in a Baptist weekly newspaper, the Watchman-Examiner.

The Catholic Bishop Fulton J. Sheen and the Evangelist Billy Graham were the first to successfully utilize the media of television to spread the Word of God in the middle of the twentieth century.

During and after the world war years, Americans generally were raised the same, and our families gave us the same value system. In school, we were taught a morality based on the Bible and the Ten Commandments, said the Lord's Prayer, recited the Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag, and sang God Bless America.

God Bless America,
Land that I love
Stand beside her,
And guide her,
Through the night
With the Light from above,
From the mountains,
To the prairies,
To the ocean,
White with foam,
God bless America,
My home sweet home.
God bless America,
My home sweet home.

The Bible guides us on the road of life, gives prophecy on the end times, and leads us to God in the afterlife. The Bible records salvation history and is composed of Hebrew Scripture, the Old Testament, which includes the Creation, the story of Adam and Eve, Moses and the Ten Commandments, and the awaiting of the Messiah. The New Testament includes the life and teachings of Jesus Christ in the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John; the Acts of the Apostles, the Letters of Paul, the Catholic or Universal Letters, and the Book of Revelation.

The civil rights movement of the 1960s was the most recent religious movement in the United States, which finally afforded racial equality for African-Americans, one hundred years after the Emancipation Proclamation! Led by Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, the movement was supported by President John F. Kennedy. African-Americans had begun to receive recognition in the fields of art, music, and sports, such as the international award-winning movie Black Orpheus; rhythm and blues singers such as the Penguins, Five Satins, and Drifters; and sports stars such as Jackie Robinson of the Brooklyn Dodgers and Jim Brown of the Cleveland Browns. But it took an unknown lady in Montgomery, Alabama named Rosa Parks, who was arrested on December 1, 1955 for refusing to move to the back of the bus for a white person, that sparked the drive for civil rights. A young pastor of the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church named Reverend King directed the Montgomery Bus boycott, which led to the end of segregation on city buses. Reverend King quoted Scripture and used non-violent means to turn the tide in favor of racial equality, a movement that culminated in his famous I Have A Dream speech on the Washington, D. C. National Mall on August 28, 1963.

This photograph of John-John Kennedy saluting his late father, President John F. Kennedy, captured the grief of our mourning nation.  This iconic photograph was taken by Stan Stearns, an UPI photographer, in the funeral procession outside St. Matthew's Cathedral on November 25, 1963, 3 days after the President's assassination in Dealey Plaza in Dallas, Texas.  This copyrighted photograph is published here with his permission.


1963 was a tumultuous year for the United States - the year of Vietnam involvement; the civil rights movement, and the Supreme Court reversal of 80 previous decisions with the removal of the Lord's prayer and Bible readings from public schools. In opposition to the CIA and the military-industrial complex, our beloved President Kennedy became an advocate for peace following the Cuban Missile Crisis of October 22, 1962, evidenced by his American University speech of June 10, 1963. His second speech on peace was given during his proposed Nuclear Test Ban Treaty on July 26, 1963, which he signed on October 7, 1963, after his third speech on peace to the United Nations September 20, 1963.

"For, in the final analysis, our most basic common link is that we all inhabit this small planet.
We all breathe the same air.
We all cherish our children's future.
And we are all mortal."

The assassination of President Kennedy on November 22, 1963 signaled the end of the American dream. The President suffered an anterior entrance neck wound from the grassy knoll in Dealey Plaza, which resulted in an exit wound which blew out the posterior of his skull. Both wounds were confirmed at Parkland Memorial Hospital in Dallas, but amazingly enough, on the same day at Bethesda Naval Hospital, America was told he had a normal skull X-ray! This led to a loss of faith and trust in our government.

Secularism and atheism themselves became puritanical in the late twentieth century, as God, the Ten Commandments, the Bible, and school prayer were stamped out of public schools, such that religion and a moral upbringing in society has been marginalized for a whole generation of Americans. The result led to guns, sex education and the distribution of prophylactics in public schools, and subsequently violence, drug abuse, and loss of respect for one's neighbor.

All these events led to the subsequent loss of values and direction in our society.

The Supreme Court needs another chance to restore freedom of religion and prayer in our schools.
To quote Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart, who wrote the dissenting opinions in both Supreme Court decisions on school prayer (Engel v Vitale and Abington v Schempp), "To deny the wish of these school children in reciting prayer is to deny them the spiritual heritage of our Nation...If religious exercises are held to be an impermissible activity in schools, religion is placed at an artificial and state-created disadvantage. Viewed in this light, permission of such exercises for those who want them is necessary if the schools are truly to be neutral in the matter of religion. And a refusal to permit religious exercises thus is seen not as the realization of state neutrality, but rather as the establishment of a religion of secularism." Atheism denies the intelligent design of the universe. The religion of secularism should then fall under the First Amendment law of religious freedom and the separation of Church and State. At present the religions of Secularism and Atheism are dictatorial, imposing their beliefs on the American people.

One can see from the Bible and the very biology of the human body that it is natural for a man and a woman to be together (Genesis 1:27-28). God created woman because "it is not good for man to be alone" (Genesis 2:18). From the beginning of time, as recorded in the Book of Genesis, God planned for man and woman to unite in marriage and live in harmony and mutual comfort for continuity of his creation, the human race (Genesis 2:23-25).

Homosexuality is the ultimate lie. Even though the Bible forbids homosexuality both in Hebrew Scripture (Leviticus 18:22) and in the New Testament (Romans 1:25-27), same-sex union is glorified as an attractive lifestyle and defended as a right by secular humanism. But realistically it is an unnatural lifestyle fraught with tragedy and danger. AIDS, the Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome, was first described in homosexual men in 1981, and, as the disease spread, was first called GRID (Gay Related Immune Disease). In fact, approximately 50% of AIDS patients in the United States are homosexual. The CDC reported in 2008 that 53% of new cases of HIV disease occur in male-to-male sexual contact. As with all human beings, it is important to treat those who lead such lives with compassion, dignity, and respect.

The most devastating effect on our future is the nightmare of abortion, as the death toll from legalized abortion reached 50 million this year. Abortion is murder, a direct violation of one of the Ten Commandments, specifically, Thou shalt not kill! (Exodus 20:13). Abortion is America's new form of slavery. No different than slavery, the woman considers the unborn infant her property, to do with the baby whatever she wants! The civil rights of the unborn remain violated, in spite of public opinion and the visualization of the baby in the mother by ultrasound. With 50 million Americans missing 36 years of age and under, this group comprises the New American Minority!

Let us contrast Mexico with the United States. Whereas abortion, homosexuality, and materialism have led to a relative sparsity of the young in the United States, 50% of the 100 million people of Mexico are under age 30! The future rests with the young. It is not difficult to see that the prevailing language of the United States of America in a generation will be Spanish.

Hablas Espanol?

The advent and arrival of the Third Millennium has brought new threats to our culture of Life and our individual Liberties. Traditional Bioethics came under attack when the first step towards euthanasia became legal in Oregon and same-sex union became legal in Vermont. The specter of a police state grew as the administration supported the invasion of our privacy through government surveillance and proposed the disarming of America, thus removing our best defense against tyranny. The Constitution was written to "secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity." Corporate greed and uncontrollable government spending have threatened our children and our long-term survival. Terrorism, the disastrous events of September 11, 2001, and the danger of an impending one world order necessitate our prayers to God to help us keep our Nation's freedom and our Western Christian civilization.


This young American waving our flag at a prayer service
became a symbol of hope following September 11, 2001.


Our children need to learn about God, the Bible, and the Ten Commandments
if we are going to preserve our Western culture.

We must support marriage and the traditional family.

We must speak up for responsible government and preserve our Bill of Rights and the sovereignty of our Nation
if we are to enjoy our God-given rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

America needs to trust in God and live in harmony with our Creator if we are to Save Our Nation.



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