The Greatest Threat to our Republic is America’s Spiritual Deficit
“Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.” – John Adams
“Morality is a necessary spring of popular government.” – George Washington
“Americans know that in a world where others seek conquest and domination, our nation must be strong in wealth, in might and in spirit.” – President Donald J. Trump, remarks at the 74th Session of the United Nations – September 24, 2019.
America is in a “spiritual recession.” America has a “national deficit of spirituality.”
This spiritual recession, the lack of morality and religion, is getting worse by the minute. Churches are failing to bring about the revival of spirituality for fear of losing their congregants or, God forbid, their non-profit status if they are bold enough to endorse moral candidates for public office. Churches fear publicly addressing the social issues that are the basis of our Republican form of government – the chief among them is a moral and religious body politic.
Voting into office men and women who are moral and religious is critical to maintaining the Republic. But today, many Americans struggle to define their values or even articulate their religious beliefs. So how can Americans effectively pick those who will represent them?
It is the “moral capital of the human spirit” that must be used to end our spiritual deficit.
Why is Spirituality important?
In the November 16th, 2012 article “Spiritual and Religious: The Benefits of Being Both” James Martin SJ wrote:
Overall, being spiritual and being religious are both part of being in relationship with God. Neither can be fully realised without the other. Religion without spirituality becomes a dry list of dogmatic statements divorced from the life of the spirit. This is what Jesus warned against. Spirituality without religion can become a self-centred complacency divorced from the wisdom of a community. That’s what I’m warning against. [Emphasis added]
In a February 27, 2013 article in Psychology Today titled “Why Be Spiritual?” Ryan T. Howell Ph.D. listed five characteristics of spiritual people:
- Spiritual people are gracious.
- Spiritual people are compassionate.
- Spiritual people flourish.
- Spiritual people self-actualize.
- Spiritual people take time to savor life experiences.
In order for America to be great we must “make America moral again.” Only a spiritually moral and religious people can keep the Republic alive and well.
A Republican Form of Government
Without moral and religious people America is no longer a Republic, we will devolve into a Democracy.
In an 1814 letter to John Taylor John Adams wrote,
“Democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts and murders itself. There was never a democracy that did not commit suicide.”
Today politicians constantly use the word Democracy to describe America. There are actually political parties called Democratic Socialists and the Democratic Party. John Adams would be shocked to learn this.
To understand one must read the U.S. Constitution, Article 4 – The States; Section 4 – Republican Government:
The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government, and shall protect each of them against Invasion; and on Application of the Legislature, or of the Executive (when the Legislature cannot be convened) against domestic Violence.
Every state of the union is a Republic. Therefore Americans, according to the Constitution, are all Republicans. To think otherwise is pure folly.
Destroying the Republic
“Human passions unbridled by morality and religion…would break the strongest cords of our Constitution as a whale goes through a net.” – John Adams
Today we see unbridled human passions at every level of government. Passions that are not tempered by morality and religion. Here in is the problem that our Founding Father foresaw.
Dr. Richard Beeman, professor of history and dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at the University of Pennsylvania, in a column titled “Perspectives on the Constitution: A Republic, if you can keep it” wrote:
If there is a lesson in all of this it is that our Constitution is neither a self-actuating nor a self-correcting document. It requires the constant attention and devotion of all citizens. There is a story, often told, that upon exiting the Constitutional Convention Benjamin Franklin was approached by a group of citizens asking what sort of government the delegates had created. His answer was: “A republic, if you can keep it.” The brevity of that response should not cause us to under-value its essential meaning: democratic republics are not merely founded upon the consent of the people, they are also absolutely dependent upon the active and informed involvement of the people for their continued good health. [Emphasis added]
On Tuesday, November 3rd, 2020 the people will decide if we will keep our Republican form of government or commit suicide.
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So very true Dr. Rich! Communists hate God, they hate Christians, and they have been working to wipe God from America for a long, long time. Prayer was taken out of school in 1962 by the Warren court. But it started long before that. FDR had numerous communists in his administration, and their pervasive hatred of the King of Glory is now widely seen.
Sooo true and a truly frightening look into our future as a country. I pray everyday for people to turn their hearts toward God and help to renew our great nation.