Free Republic

Where's the diversity? Lol.

Gay = anti-diversity orientation! ("Same" is the opposite of diverse, under the guise of diversity.)

One man one woman = diversity orientation!

http://www.Gay-Answers.com

Wow, excellent! Thanks.

"Years wasted pushing and fighting against a bunch of ... only to have to do it all over again with each new legislator...", "For a good two years I hardly even saw my mom"

Wow, I can understand where you are coming from. I'm not a lobbyist, just a citizen trying to spread Gods word to people who are required to listen by law. Your mom was very courageous, but it looks like her priorities were a bit off. When I go the the State House, I take my daughter with me and we play hide-and-seek, etc. She also gets goodies while making friends with the various legislators and aids.

These negative experiences with you mom could have made you resentful and discouraged about sharing God with legislators.

Discouragement can sometimes mean that we are trusting in man rather than God...

"'Not by might nor by power, but by my Spirit,' says the LORD Almighty." (Zech 4:6)

Christ commands us to pray and make disciples, not to expect men to listen and change their ways. That is God's job, not yours. Maybe you ARE trusting in man, and therefore you are discouraged when man or woman's efforts do not result in what you want.

If you consider our form of government evil or not, the Constitution gives you an open door to witness to your local and US legislators. The Constitution makes you a leader with legislators, judges, presidents and governors. They are YOUR agents.

No Christian American should turn down a free and open invitation to witness for God, especially when your government actually demands it of you.

The original Massachusetts Constitution says: "the people of this Commonwealth have a right to invest their legislature with power to authorize and require ... the institution of Public worship of God,"

Again, no matter how evil you may see our government today, that should be even more reason for you to take them up on their invitation...

"All power residing originally in the people, and being derived from them, the several magistrates and officers of government, vested with authority, whether legislative, executive, or judicial, are their substitutes and agents, and are at all times accountable to them."

Go and implore them to be accountable to God!

Pelayo said: "He proclaimed that they rule by His will, even those who were seemingly His enemies such as Nebuchadnezzar. And saints Peter and Paul affirm this."

That is because He is God, not because he wanted kings. "Every knee shall bow."

Pelayo said: 'That "Power's" authority is legitimised by the will of the people. I for one will not put my faith or trust in a majority of the sons of man.'

Good, then trust in God and don't listen to men and allow them to discourage you! Don't worry about the outcome if it has to do with a majority or not. Just share the word.

The pagan society in the disciples day did not stop them from influencing kings and authorities. Go and make disciples of them!

As said elsewhere on this site, all 50 of the state constitutions talk about Christianity or worshiping God and religion. The US constitution is not meant to address the worship practices of people.

Nowhere did God claim authorship of kings and princes! God did not want kings! Neither did our founding fathers. The majority of the founding fathers were religious, God fearing men. Just do a search on these pages for God, Christ, etc.

Moses did not stop the people from worshiping idols, it was God who opened up the earth and swallowed the idol worshipers. God could do the same thing today.

Don't look with your eyes at the way things are going. Look at the power our founders gave to Christians to influence our world through our state and US Constitutions. It is Christians that are not using that power and are not following the great commission of Christ to make disciples.

How many times have you visited your legislators? Would they know you by sight? Have you shared God's principles with them?

"And how about a quote from a document with actual legal standing:"

I think you are grasping at straws. What else would you say to Mussulmen at that time? This is not an organic, foundational document for the US. It is just a treaty for appeasing Mussulmen.

It looks like you took this out of context to serve your own slant. You conveniently did not highlight the qualifying part of the whole sentence: "as it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion, or tranquillity, of Mussulmen...". Clearly what this means is that the US is not founded as a Christian theocracy which would discriminate against other religions.

Now, what do you think about the following ORGANIC law? The government is supposed to encourage religion, not separate from it!

The Northwest Ordinance, one of the four organic (foundational) laws of the United States, passed in 1789 declared: "Religion, morality, and knowledge, being necessary to good government and the happiness of mankind, schools and the means of education shall forever be encouraged."

John Adams also signed the Massachusetts Constitution which says 'Article I. Any person chosen governor, lieutenant governor, councillor, senator or representative, and accepting the trust, shall before he proceed to execute the duties of his place or office, make and subscribe the following declaration, viz.--

"I, A. B., do declare, that I believe the Christian religion, and have a firm persuasion of its truth; and that I am seised and possessed, in my own right, of the property required by the constitution as one qualification for the office or place to which I am elected."'

Thomas Jefferson said: "The doctrines of Jesus are simple, and tend all to the happiness of mankind." -- The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, Albert Bergh, editor (Washington, D. C.: Thomas Jefferson Memorial Assoc., 1904), Vol. XV, p. 383.

Does that sound like a radical deist?

Again, I think you are grasping a straws.

"Why shoud we? By that very logic those same founding fathers should have obeyed their King over the issue of a very minor tax, instead of sinning against the will of God by rebellion."

So that's why they revolted, over a "very minor tax"? Last time I checked, there was religious oppression and injustice.

You seem to be comparing obeying God under unjust conditions with obeying God under friendly and biblically conducive conditions.

"Why should we?" Christ commanded us to influence our world for God. That is why. We are to be salt and light. The founding fathers of America incorporated these principles into the Constitution so that we could obey Christ.

We have been given freedom of religious speech. Each individual has been given leadership obligations by the Constitution, i.e., governing officials are now your agents and my agents for us to influence for the cause of good. Since you have been made a leader by your government to influence your legislators and also made a leader by Christ (if you are a Christian) to "make disciples" and influence society, then you can't just do hardly anything and expect the blessing of God. Therefore "give unto Caesar".

"Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed"

Yes, but God can't, or doesn't choose to vote! This is likely why there are such protections, rights and obligations especially found in the state constitutions for people to worship God. This way, the founders could best guarantee a moral and biblical godly based government far into the future.

However, we have failed to do as Christ said to "give unto Caesar" and obey the intentions of our founding fathers to influence our government for God. We are asleep at the wheel as radical groups of people are in our state houses day after day turning the tide against God.

"However since about 85% of the Constitution is English Common Law the traditions you speak of were certainly inherent."

The founders didn't say the ten commandments were inherent as some long gone influence that they would grudgingly have to tolerate as a religious influence from history. They said that the very foundation of the Constitution IS directly based on Christianity and the ten commandments.

There is no mention of a secular basis in the Constitution, so according to your logic that must prove that it is based on God.

All 50 constitutions mention God as the source. Tell me which of the founding fathers (see below) changed the foundation of the Constitution from God, Christianity and the ten commandments to pure secularism completely void of God all of a sudden when it came to the US Constitution?

Joseph Story is THE man to nail this down: "There never has been a period in which the Common Law did not recognize Christianity as lying its foundations."

Need I say more? Let's hear from a few more important founders...

Thomas Jefferson said, in 1781 just after the Massachusetts constitution was ratified: "God who gave us life gave us liberty. And can the liberties of a nation be thought secure when we have removed their only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people that these liberties are the Gift of God? That they are not to be violated but with His wrath? Indeed, I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just; that His justice cannot sleep forever.?" -- Notes on the State of Virginia, Query XVIII, 1781, p. 237

James Madison: "I have sometimes thought there could not be a stronger testimony in favor of religion or against temporal enjoyments, even the most rational and manly, than for men who occupy the most honorable and gainful departments [of government] and are rising in reputation and wealth, publicly to declare their unsatisfactoriness by becoming fervent advocates in the cause of Christ; and I wish you may give in your evidence in this way." -- Letter of Madison to William Bradford (September 25, 1773), in 1 James Madison, The Papers of James Madison 66 (William T. Hutchinson ed., Illinois: University of Chicago Press 1962).

George Washington: "... forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle. It is substantially true, that virtue or morality is a necessary spring of popular government. The rule, indeed, extends with more or less force to every species of free government. Who, that is a sincere friend to it, can look with indifference upon attempts to shake the foundation of the fabric? -- Address of George Washington, President of the United States . . . Preparatory to His Declination (Baltimore: George and Henry S. Keatinge), pp. 22-23. In his Farewell Address to the United States in 1796

Benjamin Rush (Signer of the Declaration of Independence): "...the only means of establishing and perpetuating our republican forms of government, that is, the universal education of our youth in the principles of Christianity by the means of the Bible. For this Divine Book, above all others, favors that equality among mankind, that respect for just laws, and those sober and frugal virtues, which constitute the soul of republicanism. -- Essays, Literary, Moral and Philosophical (Philadelphia: Printed by Thomas and William Bradford, 1806), pp. 93-94.

Th Jefferson: "I reciprocate your kind prayers for the protection & blessing of the common father and creator of man [God], and tender you for yourselves & your religious association, assurances of my high respect & esteem." -- Jan. 1. 1802.

Thomas Jefferson: "The doctrines of Jesus are simple, and tend all to the happiness of mankind." -- The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, Albert Bergh, editor (Washington, D. C.: Thomas Jefferson Memorial Assoc., 1904), Vol. XV, p. 383.

See: http://www.wall-of-separation.com

"Those are general statements about the need for the populace to have a religious foundation since the Constitution itself is secular."

It sounds like you have your mind made up about the "secular" Constitution and are just trying to rationalize around what is clearly being said by these founding fathers...

"Christianity is a part of the Common Law. . . . There never has been a period in which the Common Law did not recognize Christianity as lying its foundations."

"The law given from Sinai [the 10 commandments] was a civil and municipal ... code; it contained many statutes . . . of universal application-laws..."

Massachusetts Constitution 1780 Article III: "...the good order and preservation of civil government, essentially DEPEND upon piety, religion and morality... ...the legislature shall, from time to time, authorize and REQUIRE, the several towns, parishes, precincts, and other bodies politic, or religious societies, to make suitable provision, at their own expense, for the institution of the public worship of God," (emphasis added)

Massachusetts Constitution Chapter 4, Article I: 'Any person chosen governor, lieutenant governor, councillor, senator or representative, and accepting the trust, shall before he proceed to execute the duties of his place or office, make and subscribe the following declaration, viz.--

"I, A. B., do declare, that I believe the Christian religion, and have a firm persuasion of its truth; and that I am seised and possessed, in my own right, of the property required by the constitution as one qualification for the office or place to which I am elected."'

'Separation'? On the contrary! This first Constitution on which all others are based is unquestionably based on Christianity and provides every means and encouragement to ensure it's dissipation throughout society. Try Constitution.MA

How far we have fallen. Now Massachusetts is considering amending their constitution to support gender anti-equality (i.e. homosexual same-sex preference) as equal with the gender equality and diversity of one man + one woman (heterosexuality). See www.same-sex-gay-marriage.com

"And if someone could explain how The Ten Commandments are the basis of the Constitution I'm all ears."

John Quincy Adams, Sixth President of the United States: "The law given from Sinai [the 10 commandments] was a civil and municipal as well as a moral and religious code; it contained many statutes . . . of universal application-laws essential to the existence of men in society, and most of which have been enacted by every nation which ever professed any code of laws." -- Letters of John Quincy Adams, to His Son, on the Bible and Its Teachings (Auburn: James M. Alden, 1850), p. 61

Joseph Story appointed to the Supreme Court by President James Madison: "I verily believe Christianity necessary to the support of civil society. One of the beautiful boasts of our municipal jurisprudence is that Christianity is a part of the Common Law. . . . There never has been a period in which the Common Law did not recognize Christianity as lying its foundations." -- Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States; and 1829 speech at Harvard

See http://www.wall-of-separation.com