YES, America CERTAINLY WAS FOUNDED as a CHRISTIAN NATION...

[UltimateReality]

They seem pretty upset that their version of a deity isn't acknowledged as the one and only this nation was founded on.....even tho they can't give us any proof it was.

I have given you mountains of proof. Did you even bother to check out any of the documents on the Yale Avalon project links? Apparently not. I really tire of these strawman debates. I am not claiming no freedom of religion. I am claiming the first colonies were founded by men who claimed the reason they traveled to the New World was for the glory of God and the advancement of the Christian faith. I am claiming that professing Christian men authored many of our founding documents. I am claiming the Christian inspired belief that our inalienable rights come from our Creator-capital C. I am claming that many of the founding documents prior to the US Constitution provided references to God and Jesus. I am claiming that Christian services were held in the House of Representatives for almost 100 years. I am claiming that numerous presidents held Christian beliefs and called on the nation to engage in those beliefs, including national days of fasting and prayer. I am claiming that even claimed diests like Ben Franklin called for prayer at the opening of the Constitutional Convention and made specific references to the Bible. I am claiming that one of the requirements to serve in the earlier colonial governments was to be a professing Christian.

And the Constitution expressly eliminated that requirement. You DO know that, right?

I am claiming the God of "In God We Trust" and "One Nation Under God" is the Christian God, not the Baptist, Methodist, Catholic, Presbyterian, Puritan, Hindu, or Muslim God.

Can anyone deny these claims?

People of those sects would be shocked to hear they are not Christian.

You miss both points entirely. Christian is a religion. Baptist, Methodist, etc. are denominations.

 

[UltimateReality]

Define "the nation" then....as YOU used it, of course.

The nation is the people silly. The government is the people that think they know best for the rest of the people.

Ah, so the PEOPLE of the United States are christian? The Jews, Muslims, Sikhs, Buddhists, Pagans, Hindus, Atheists etc would be interested in you stating that they don't count as part of "the nation."

You have presented a strawman... again.

No one said they don't count. Give me your tired, poor and huddled masses. But what is being claimed is that they were never a part of founding this nation. Go back and find my link to the online copy of the Alcoran of Muhammed and read the intros. You can see what the prevailing thought at the time was of Muslims.

 

[UltimateReality]

Might I remind observers to evaluate Christianity on its teachings and not on the flawed, fallen humans claiming Christianity. A Christian is defined as merely a Christ follower. So your lesson for today is to paint the picture of what a Christian looks like according to the Bible. If the person is claiming to be a Christ follower, but isn't described below, proceed with caution.

Galatians 5:22-23
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.

1 Corinthians 13 (New International Version)

13 If I speak in the tongues[a] of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. 3 If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.

4 Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5 It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

8 Love never fails.

Nice quotes...but need I remind you, the bible is not the Cosntitution, nor is our government and laws based on the bible. (Tho The Song of Solomon might be an interesting take on our laws)

Bodey, the points of these points is zinging right over your head. This post was provided so observers would not pass judgement on Christianity based on people who are making that claim but their actions are not showing it. There was no inference to be drawn from this post regarding the relationship of the Bible to the Constitution. This phrase should have tipped you off "Might I remind observers to evaluate Christianity on its teachings and not on the flawed, fallen humans claiming Christianity."

 

[UltimateReality]

By the President of the United States of America
A Proclamation March 30th, 1861

Whereas the Senate of the United States, devoutly recognizing the supreme authority and just government of Almighty God in all the affairs of men and of nations, has by a resolution requested the President to designate and set apart a day for national prayer and humiliation; and

Whereas it is the duty of nations as well as of men to own their dependence upon the overruling power of God, to confess their sins and transgressions in humble sorrow, yet with assured hope that genuine repentance will lead to mercy and pardon, and to recognize the sublime truth, announced in the Holy Scriptures and proven by all history, that those nations only are blessed whose God is the Lord;

And, insomuch as we know that by His divine law nations, like individuals, are subjected to punishments and chastisements in this world, may we not justly fear that the awful calamity of civil war which now desolates the land may be but a punishment inflicted upon us for our presumptuous sins, to the needful end of our national reformation as a whole people? We have been the recipients of the choicest bounties of Heaven; we have been preserved these many years in peace and prosperity; we have grown in numbers, wealth, and power as no other nation has ever grown. But we have forgotten God. We have forgotten the gracious hand which preserved us in peace and multiplied and enriched and strengthened us, and we have vainly imagined, in the deceitfulness of our hearts, that all these blessings were produced by some superior wisdom and virtue of our own. Intoxicated with unbroken success, we have become too self-sufficient to feel the necessity of redeeming and preserving grace, too proud to pray to the God that made us.

It behooves us, then, to humble ourselves before the offended Power, to confess our national sins, and to pray for clemency and forgiveness.

Now, therefore, in compliance with the request, and fully concurring in the views of the Senate, I do by this my proclamation designate and set apart Thursday, the 30th day of April, 1863, as a day of national humiliation, fasting, and prayer. And I do hereby request all the people to abstain on that day from their ordinary secular pursuits, and to unite at their several places of public worship and their respective homes in keeping the day holy to the Lord and devoted to the humble discharge of the religious duties proper to that solemn occasion.

All this being done in sincerity and truth, let us then rest humbly in the hope authorized by the divine teachings that the united cry of the nation will be heard on high and answered with blessings no less than the pardon of our national sins and the restoration of our now divided and suffering country to its former happy condition of unity and peace. In witness whereof I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed.

Done at the city of Washington, this 30th day of March, A. D. 1863, and of the Independence of the United States the eighty-seventh.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN.

By the President:

WILLIAM H. SEWARD, Secretary of State .

#1. What holiday is that now?

#2. Do we get off for it?

#3. Is it manditory to worship a christian god during it?

It's the same day. A google search prior to asking the question would save some wasted pages.

National Day of Prayer - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The National Day of Prayer (36 U.S.C. § 119)[1] is an annual day of observance held on the first Thursday of May, designated by the United States Congress, when people are asked "to turn to God in prayer and meditation". Each year, the president signs a proclamation, encouraging all Americans to pray on this day.[2] The modern law formalizing its annual observance was enacted in 1952, although it has historical origins to a mandate by George Washington, the first president of the United States.[3][4][5]

On the National Day of Prayer, Americans from all religious backgrounds turn to God in prayer for the United States.[6] Its constitutionality[UR: WOW!! REALLY?] was unsuccessfully challenged in court by the Freedom From Religion Foundation after their first attempt was unanimously dismissed by a federal appellate court in April 2011.[7][8][9]

 

[UltimateReality]

Huh. So the Founders used a nineteenth century dictionary in the eighteenth century. I guess they were pretty ahead of their time!

Wow, ignorance is rampant in this thread. Do you even know why the first dictionary was created and why?

Irrelevant.

Wrong!!!

 

[Crackerjack]

Wow, ignorance is rampant in this thread. Do you even know why the first dictionary was created and why?

Irrelevant.

Wrong!!!

Right!!!

Your turn.

 

[UltimateReality]

What exactly is the point of getting your panties in a wad over whether the US is or is not a "Christian nation"?

Still no answer.

Guess you must have missed it. Answered in post #356.

 

[UltimateReality]

Irrelevant.

Wrong!!!

Right!!!

Your turn.

What's the point in arguing? You information is made up and not based on history.

The use of the word Lord to reference Christ and God was common vernacular in the 17th and 18th centuries. This was entirely the result of the King James Translation that was completed in 1611. The word Lord appears 7,380 times in reference to God or Christ. So dictionary or no dictionary, that is what it meant.

But just for your reference, since you didn't answer the other question...

Here is the entry from Websters 1828 Dictionary:

LORD, n.

1. A master; a person possessing supreme power and authority; a ruler; a governor.

Man over man he made not lord.

But now I was the lord of this fair mansion.

2. A tyrant; an oppressive ruler.

3. A husband.

I oft in bitterness of soul deplores my absent daughter, and my dearer lord.

My lord also being old. Gen. 18.

4. A baron; the proprietor of a manor; as the lord of the manor.

5. A nobleman; a title of honor in Great Britain given to those who are noble by birth or creation; a peer of the realm, including dukes, marquises, earls, viscounts and barons. Archbishops and bishops also, as members of the house of lords, are lords of parliament. Thus we say, lords temporal and spiritual. By courtesy also the title is given to the sons of dukes and marquises, and to the eldest sons of earls.

6. An honorary title bestowed on certain official characters; as lord advocate, lord chamberlain, lord chancellor, lord chief justice, &c.

7. In scripture, the Supreme Being; Jehovah. When Lord, in the Old Testament, is prints in capitals, it is the translation of JEHOVAH, and so might, with more propriety, be rendered. The word is applied to Christ, Ps. 110. Col. 3. and to the Holy Spirit, 2Thess. 3. As a title of respect, it is applied to kings, Gen. 40. 2Sam. 19. to princes and nobles, Gen 42. Dan. 4. to a husband, Gen. 18. to a prophet, 1Kings 18. 2Kings 2. and to a respectable person, Gen. 24. Christ is called the Lord of glory, 1Cor. 2. and Lord of lords, Rev. 19.

 

[Hollie]

Second Inaugural Address of Abraham Lincoln

SATURDAY, MARCH 4, 1865
Fellow-Countrymen:

At this second appearing to take the oath of the Presidential office there is less occasion for an extended address than there was at the first. Then a statement somewhat in detail of a course to be pursued seemed fitting and proper. Now, at the expiration of four years, during which public declarations have been constantly called forth on every point and phase of the great contest which still absorbs the attention and engrosses the energies of the nation, little that is new could be presented. The progress of our arms, upon which all else chiefly depends, is as well known to the public as to myself, and it is, I trust, reasonably satisfactory and encouraging to all. With high hope for the future, no prediction in regard to it is ventured.

On the occasion corresponding to this four years ago all thoughts were anxiously directed to an impending civil war. All dreaded it, all sought to avert it. While the inaugural address was being delivered from this place, devoted altogether to saving the Union without war, insurgent agents were in the city seeking to destroy it without war--seeking to dissolve the Union and divide effects by negotiation. Both parties deprecated war, but one of them would make war rather than let the nation survive, and the other would accept war rather than let it perish, and the war came.

One-eighth of the whole population were colored slaves, not distributed generally over the Union, but localized in the southern part of it. These slaves constituted a peculiar and powerful interest. All knew that this interest was somehow the cause of the war. To strengthen, perpetuate, and extend this interest was the object for which the insurgents would rend the Union even by war, while the Government claimed no right to do more than to restrict the territorial enlargement of it. Neither party expected for the war the magnitude or the duration which it has already attained. Neither anticipated that the cause of the conflict might cease with or even before the conflict itself should cease. Each looked for an easier triumph, and a result less fundamental and astounding. Both read the same Bible and pray to the same God, and each invokes His aid against the other. It may seem strange that any men should dare to ask a just God's assistance in wringing their bread from the sweat of other men's faces, but let us judge not, that we be not judged. The prayers of both could not be answered. That of neither has been answered fully. The Almighty has His own purposes. "Woe unto the world because of offenses; for it must needs be that offenses come, but woe to that man by whom the offense cometh." If we shall suppose that American slavery is one of those offenses which, in the providence of God, must needs come, but which, having continued through His appointed time, He now wills to remove, and that He gives to both North and South this terrible war as the woe due to those by whom the offense came, shall we discern therein any departure from those divine attributes which the believers in a living God always ascribe to Him? Fondly do we hope, fervently do we pray, that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away. Yet, if God wills that it continue until all the wealth piled by the bondsman's two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword, as was said three thousand years ago, so still it must be said "the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether."

With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation's wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan, to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations.

It seems that we've been subjected to a cut and paste jihad.

That was a pointless waste of bandwidth as a president making claims to gods is not the constitution.

I have yet to see the U.S. defined by the constitution as a "christian nation". It seems the christian jihadist doesn't have a clue as to the wording and intent of the constitution.

Fortunately, that very constitution protects us all from fundie zealots who little different from the Taliban except for choice of religion.

And here is Hollie on auto repeat.

I'm flattered that you have this need to direct your cutting and pasting to me but what is your point?

You're spending huge amounts of time cutting and pasting from other web sites but you refuse to see the futility in doing so. You have this need and desire to force Christianity on the Founding Fathers when so many of them rejected that religion.

You spend huge amounts if time cutting and pasting comments and speeches made by historical figures without understanding that the constitution was designed to allow free speech/ expression.

 

[Hollie]

Wrong!!!

Right!!!

Your turn.

What's the point in arguing? You information is made up and not based on history.

The use of the word Lord to reference Christ and God was common vernacular in the 17th and 18th centuries. This was entirely the result of the King James Translation that was completed in 1611. The word Lord appears 7,380 times in reference to God or Christ. So dictionary or no dictionary, that is what it meant.

But just for your reference, since you didn't answer the other question...

Here is the entry from Websters 1828 Dictionary:

LORD, n.

1. A master; a person possessing supreme power and authority; a ruler; a governor.

Man over man he made not lord.

But now I was the lord of this fair mansion.

2. A tyrant; an oppressive ruler.

3. A husband.

I oft in bitterness of soul deplores my absent daughter, and my dearer lord.

My lord also being old. Gen. 18.

4. A baron; the proprietor of a manor; as the lord of the manor.

5. A nobleman; a title of honor in Great Britain given to those who are noble by birth or creation; a peer of the realm, including dukes, marquises, earls, viscounts and barons. Archbishops and bishops also, as members of the house of lords, are lords of parliament. Thus we say, lords temporal and spiritual. By courtesy also the title is given to the sons of dukes and marquises, and to the eldest sons of earls.

6. An honorary title bestowed on certain official characters; as lord advocate, lord chamberlain, lord chancellor, lord chief justice, &c.

7. In scripture, the Supreme Being; Jehovah. When Lord, in the Old Testament, is prints in capitals, it is the translation of JEHOVAH, and so might, with more propriety, be rendered. The word is applied to Christ, Ps. 110. Col. 3. and to the Holy Spirit, 2Thess. 3. As a title of respect, it is applied to kings, Gen. 40. 2Sam. 19. to princes and nobles, Gen 42. Dan. 4. to a husband, Gen. 18. to a prophet, 1Kings 18. 2Kings 2. and to a respectable person, Gen. 24. Christ is called the Lord of glory, 1Cor. 2. and Lord of lords, Rev. 19.

What pointless nonsense.

Neither lord, god(s), Big Cheese, hey-Zeus, Jehovah, Yahweh, etc., is mentioned in the constitution.

In case you missed it, people making claims to one if more gods in a public speech is protected by free expression. You're having a great deal of difficulty coming to terms with that.

 

[UltimateReality]

As a side note, here is the preface to the 1828 Websters Dictionary:

In my view, the Christian religion is the most important and one of the first things in which all children, under a free government ought to be instructed.. .No truth is more evident to my mind than that the Christian religion must be the basis of any government intended to secure the rights and privileges of a free people.
- Preface

 

[UltimateReality]

It seems that we've been subjected to a cut and paste jihad.

That was a pointless waste of bandwidth as a president making claims to gods is not the constitution.

I have yet to see the U.S. defined by the constitution as a "christian nation". It seems the christian jihadist doesn't have a clue as to the wording and intent of the constitution.

Fortunately, that very constitution protects us all from fundie zealots who little different from the Taliban except for choice of religion.

And here is Hollie on auto repeat.

I'm flattered that you have this need to direct your cutting and pasting to me but what is your point?

You're spending huge amounts of time cutting and pasting from other web sites but you refuse to see the futility in doing so. You have this need and desire to force Christianity on the Founding Fathers when so many of them rejected that religion.

You spend huge amounts if time cutting and pasting comments and speeches made by historical figures without understanding that the constitution was designed to allow free speech/ expression.

Why are you stalking me?

 

[UltimateReality]

Neither lord...is mentioned in the constitution.

Wrong! The word Lord is specifically mentioned in Article VII. You got owned.

 

[Hollie]

And here is Hollie on auto repeat.

I'm flattered that you have this need to direct your cutting and pasting to me but what is your point?

You're spending huge amounts of time cutting and pasting from other web sites but you refuse to see the futility in doing so. You have this need and desire to force Christianity on the Founding Fathers when so many of them rejected that religion.

You spend huge amounts if time cutting and pasting comments and speeches made by historical figures without understanding that the constitution was designed to allow free speech/ expression.

Why are you stalking me?

I responded to your post wherein you identified me.

Are you forgetting what you have posted?

 

[Crackerjack]

What exactly is the point of getting your panties in a wad over whether the US is or is not a "Christian nation"?

Still no answer.

Guess you must have missed it. Answered in post #356.

It does not say why it is important that the Creator be the Christian god, nor does it address the question as to why it is so vitally important to you that this be seen as a Christian nation.

 

[UltimateReality]

I'm flattered that you have this need to direct your cutting and pasting to me but what is your point?

You're spending huge amounts of time cutting and pasting from other web sites but you refuse to see the futility in doing so. You have this need and desire to force Christianity on the Founding Fathers when so many of them rejected that religion.

You spend huge amounts if time cutting and pasting comments and speeches made by historical figures without understanding that the constitution was designed to allow free speech/ expression.

Why are you stalking me?

I responded to your post wherein you identified me.

Are you forgetting what you have posted?

No, but you selectively forget my posts when it suits you...

Wrong! The word Lord is specifically mentioned in Article VII. You got owned.

 

[UltimateReality]

Still no answer.

Guess you must have missed it. Answered in post #356.

It does not say why it is important that the Creator be the Christian god, nor does it address the question as to why it is so vitally important to you that this be seen as a Christian nation.

We are no longer a Christian nation. But we once were. It is vitally important for us to understand history, because the past influences the future. Revisionist try to change the past in order to influence current thought. It is important for me and for my children to know the REAL story about our nation, not the ACLU and atheist modified version.

I think it can be summed up in a few quotes by Gouverneur Morris as to where our nation is headed, and why it is important to me that we not eradicate our Christian Roots...

"Religion is the only solid basis of good morals; therefore education should teach the precepts of religion and the duties of man toward God."- United States Founding Father, Signer and Penman of the Constitution, Gouverneur Morris, "The Life of Governeur Morris", Jared Sparks, (Boston: Gray and Bowen, 1832), Vol. III, p. 483, from his "Notes on the Form of a Constitution for France"

"The reflection and experience of many years have led me to consider the Holy writings not only as the most authentic and instructive in themselves, but as the clue to all other history. They tell us what man is, and they alone tell us why he is what he is: a contradictory creature that seeing and approving of what is good, pursues and performs what is evil. All of private and public life is there displayed. ... From the same pure fountain of wisdom we learn that vice destroys freedom; that arbitrary power is founded on public immorality." - United States Founding Father, Signer and Penman of the Constitution, Gouverneur Morris, "Collections of the New York historical Society for the Year 1821", (New York: E. Bliss and E. White, 1821), p. 30, from "An Inaugural Discourse Delivered Before the New York Historical Society byt the Honorable Gouverneur Morris", September 4, 1816 [/I]

 

[Crackerjack]

Wrong!!!

Right!!!

Your turn.

What's the point in arguing? You information is made up and not based on history.

The use of the word Lord to reference Christ and God was common vernacular in the 17th and 18th centuries. This was entirely the result of the King James Translation that was completed in 1611. The word Lord appears 7,380 times in reference to God or Christ. So dictionary or no dictionary, that is what it meant.

Circular argument.

But just for your reference, since you didn't answer the other question...

Here is the entry from Websters 1828 Dictionary:

LORD, n.

1. A master; a person possessing supreme power and authority; a ruler; a governor.

Man over man he made not lord.

But now I was the lord of this fair mansion.

2. A tyrant; an oppressive ruler.

3. A husband.

I oft in bitterness of soul deplores my absent daughter, and my dearer lord.

My lord also being old. Gen. 18.

4. A baron; the proprietor of a manor; as the lord of the manor.

5. A nobleman; a title of honor in Great Britain given to those who are noble by birth or creation; a peer of the realm, including dukes, marquises, earls, viscounts and barons. Archbishops and bishops also, as members of the house of lords, are lords of parliament. Thus we say, lords temporal and spiritual. By courtesy also the title is given to the sons of dukes and marquises, and to the eldest sons of earls.

6. An honorary title bestowed on certain official characters; as lord advocate, lord chamberlain, lord chancellor, lord chief justice, &c.

7. In scripture, the Supreme Being; Jehovah. When Lord, in the Old Testament, is prints in capitals, it is the translation of JEHOVAH, and so might, I more propriety, be rendered. The word is applied to Christ, Ps. 110. Col. 3. and to the Holy Spirit, 2Thess. 3. As a title of respect, it is applied to kings, Gen. 40. 2Sam. 19. to princes and nobles, Gen 42. Dan. 4. to a husband, Gen. 18. to a prophet, 1Kings 18. 2Kings 2. and to a respectable person, Gen. 24. Christ is called the Lord of glory, 1Cor. 2. and Lord of lords, Rev. 19.

You do realize that these definitions are listed in order of preference, right?

 

[Crackerjack]

As a side note, here is the preface to the 1828 Websters Dictionary:

In my view, the Christian religion is the most important and one of the first things in which all children, under a free government ought to be instructed.. .No truth is more evident to my mind than that the Christian religion must be the basis of any government intended to secure the rights and privileges of a free people.
- Preface

Irrelevant, unless you somehow think Noah Webster was a Founding Father.

 

[Hollie]

Neither lord...is mentioned in the constitution.

Wrong! The word Lord is specifically mentioned in Article VII. You got owned.

In an amendment to the constitution. Why do you assume "in the year of our lord", is the Christian lord as opposed to gods?

Yet another desperate attempt on your part to try and force your religion on others.