Answering Tough Questions - What does it mean to be an American?

Yesterday we asked tough questions. It is time to beginning answering them, in the time we have left. With every bit of news that comes from Capitol Hill, another of your freedoms, another piece of who we are as Americans erodes. A one world currency is being discussed. Gun control is being suggested as the answer to the Mexican drug cartel violence along the border. Nationalized health care is being discussed as one solution to our economic woes. The UN Convention on the Rights of the Child inches closer toward being adopted in the US, while at the same time more money is being committed to fund abortion than ever before (and yes, this irony is lost on those who endorse these positions). So we may have very little time left, but we will use it wisely.

Our country was founded upon a strong Christian ethic. This is crucial, because for a society to be ruled by Law, that Law must have an objective source outside (and indeed above) that society. Otherwise we can make up the rules as we go along, and the majority opinion becomes that source of "right" and "wrong." But there must be an objective standard to which we aspire; there must be a thing that is right, even if every person stands against it; and there must be a thing that is wrong, should every person favor it. To fall under the sway of simple majority rule is to hand the Republic over to a mob.

While not all of our founding fathers were Christians, they lived their lives heavily influenced by a Christian worldview. Read the Declaration of Independence, here:

http://www.ushistory.org/declaration/document/index.htm

The entire idea behind this document is that a King cannot violate the Law of Nature's God with impunity; that even a King is accountable for his actions to the Almighty. It is to our Creator that the founders appealed for the right to form their own government. If our rebellion was merely based upon our whims and wishes - on what a simple majority believed to be true - then we should crawl back to England right now begging forgiveness. But it was not; we believed then (and I believe now) that there are higher virtues than Earthly government to which all men are accountable, and must be accountable. Some thing are always right, and some things are always wrong. The world does indeed conform to certain absolutes, to Good and Evil. This is something that should be fundamental to every American: there is a Creator, and he has endowed us with certain unalienable rights. Most Americans now would agree with me on this point. But the other half of this statement, unspoken in the Declaration but borne out in the lives of those who wrote it, is this: our Creator has also endowed us with certain unalienable responsibilities.

To be a citizen, to be an American, is to have the right to life, and liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. But it too often goes unsaid that there is a price to pay, and I am guilty of ignoring the cost of this for nearly my whole life as well. Read the last lines of the Declaration: they pledged their life, liberty and their honor to defend their rights. They knew there was a price to pay, and many of them paid it.

Much like those of us who grew up in Christian homes and often take our Christianity for granted, we as Americans take our liberties for granted because they cost us nothing. Now those basic liberties are being threatened because we elected officials who are taking them away from us. We need to get informed and be aware of who or what we are voting for when we vote. We need to be aware of the laws Congress are passing, and the laws they are considering for passage. It is not just a right, but a responsibility to be involved in the process, and we must take it seriously.