What makes America great?

“We’re no better than anyone else. Every person on the planet is the same.”

So what makes America ‘the greatest nation in the history of the world?’ Our system. And what makes our system different and better? God.

The quotes above come from Eric Metaxus, author of a new book, “Revolution: The birth of the greatest nation in the history of the world.”

He says America’s greatness is a “simple fact.” And that the key to this greatness was the way our country’s Founders returned to the Sinai Covenant of the Old Testament and replaced an earthly king (pharaoh) with a heavenly King.

This King, our creator, created all men equally, bestowing three essential rights on each: Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness. As the Declaration of Independence proclaims, these rights are “inalienable,’ a word on which many stumble.

It means that these rights are natural, non-negotiable, inviolable, non-transferable, and essential to being human. Because they have been gifted by God, men can’t take them away.

 

Fightin’ words?

These are fightin’ words for some pro-abortion politicians. One, Senator Tim Kaine of Virginia, recently mocked the notion:

“The notion that rights don’t come from laws and don’t come from the government, but come from the Creator — that’s what the Iranian government believes.”

Sadly, this senator speaks for many of his party. But what else could he say? After all, they support and promote laws that take away the God-given right to Life as proclaimed in the Declaration.

Although Thomas Jefferson authored the Declaration of Independence, he based much of its formulation on the state of Virginia’s Declaration of Rights, authored by George Mason.

Mason was a farmer and statesman who expressed the essence of the Declaration slightly differently than Jefferson:

”That all men are by nature equally free and independent and have certain inherent rights, of which, when they enter into a state of society, they cannot, by any compact, deprive or divest their posterity; namely, the enjoyment of life and liberty, with the means of acquiring and possessing property, and pursuing and obtaining happiness and safety.”

Human abortion, as promoted by Senator Kaine and his party, obviously divests our posterity from the enjoyment of Life. It is an affront to our Creator, the giver of life.

The ‘God gap’

Many on the Progressive Left push back against invoking God, which is not surprising. A ‘God gap’ exists within today’s abortion party.

Using a dataset tracked by the General Social Survey, Ryan Burge, a Professor of Practice at Washington University, reports on the precipitous drop in religious faith among members of the Democratic Party.

In the 1990s, 63% of Democrats believed in God with “no doubt.” That dropped to 39% by the 2020s.

In the 1990s, 31% of Democrats attended weekly religious service compared  to 19% by the 2020s.

In the 1990s, 11% of Democrats said they had no religious faith compared 34% in the 2020s.

[By contrast, the religious views of rank and file Republicans hasn’t changed much: in the 1990s, 67% believed in God without doubt compared to 63% in the 2020s.]

The ‘God gap’ affects political beliefs

Democrats’ decline in religious faith produced radical changes in what they stand for politically. 

• In the 1990s, they called for abortion to be safe, legal, but rare. Today, they demand taxpayer-funded abortions for the full nine months of a pregnancy.
• In the 1990s, they supported the death penalty and the Defense of Marriage Act. Today, they don’t even want to expel illegal immigrants from our country who have committed capital offenses. And they support so-called same-sex marriage.
• In the 1990s, they called for deficit reduction, deregulation and promoted free trade. (A Democratic president, Bill Clinton was the last president to balance the budget.) Today, they don’t.
• In the 1990s, they supported and passed welfare reform with work requirements and limited benefits. They reject both today.
• In the 1990s, Democrats were tough on crime and passed the Community Oriented Policing Services Act that used federal funding to put 100,000 additional police officers on American streets. Today, they demand we defund the police.
• In the 1990s, Democrats were tough on illegal immigration, militarizing the Southern border, increasing ICE agents. and adding physical barriers. Today, they call for open borders and eliminating ICE.

Some of these shifts are affected by changing religious beliefs; others less so. But their shifting views on family are very much animated by their fading embrace of the Judeo-Christian underpinnings of America.

For example, 66% of Republicans believe marriages make society better off compared to 40% of Democrats.

The significance: 88% of abortions take place outside of marriage. The more marriage, the less abortion.

Even more, married couples are healthier, happier, and wealthier than their unmarried counterparts. So are their children. The more religious someone is, the more they believe in marriage.

So to return to the question at the outset: what makes America great? It is a belief in God’s providence for our land, and that providence flows from our respect for the rights of Mankind as bestowed by our Creator.

Non religious activists try to downplay America’s Judeo/Christian roots by labeling our Founders as merely deists, rather than true Christians. Although deists believe in God as creator of the universe, they seen Him as a hands-off deity uninvolved in our destinies or personal struggles.

Listen to George Washington:

“The hand of Providence has been so conspicuous in all this, that he must be worse than an infidel that lacks faith, and more than wicked, that has not gratitude enough to acknowledge his obligations…”

As Eric Metaxus puts it, “Deists don’t talk like that!”

For America to survive, we need our citizens to turn back to God.

We’re seeing positive signs that that is happening in the Catholic Church. Every diocese in the country is experiencing a gusher in new membership. Young people drive the surge. 

And what drives them? The New York Times writes that they seek objective truth, community, and spiritual stability to counter the isolation and anxiety of modern life.

Let us hope the trend continues. Belief in God is the lifeblood of this nation. So what makes America great? 

God.