For
the first 150 years of America’s existence no one questioned the axiom, “America
is a Christian nation.” This did not mean that everyone was a Christian or that
the nation officially sanctioned any religious sect or denomination, but that
the nation’s laws and institutions were founded on Christian principles and
values. This fact was stated by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1892 in the case of “Church of the Holy Trinity vs The United States.” After examining
thousands of historical documents, the nation’s highest Court declared,
There is no dissonance in these declarations. There is a universal language pervading them all, having one meaning. They affirm and reaffirm that this is a religious nation . . . From the discovery of
this continent to the present hour, there is a single voice making this
affirmation. These and many other matters which might be noticed, add a volume of unofficial declarations to the mass of organic utterances that this is a Christian nation (Hyatt, 1726: The Year that Defined America, 6-7).
This reality was
expressed in American culture by Bible reading and prayer being common
occurrences in all kinds of public settings since the nation’s founding. Until
the 1960s, it was common for school days, school activities, sporting events, city
councils, and other public events to be opened with prayer. Bible verses,
crosses, and Ten Commandment displays were common on public property.
The
nation was shocked, therefore, when, in two Supreme Court rulings, Engel vs. Vitale
(1962) and Abingdon School District vs. Schempp (1963), the nation’s highest court banned school-sponsored prayer and Bible
reading in the public schools of America. This ruling was based on a contorted
and novel interpretation of the First Amendment that reads,
“Congress shall make no law concerning the establishment of religion, or
hindering the free exercise thereof.”
This
ruling opened the floodgates of anti-Christian activism. Since that time, lawsuits
filed by atheist/secularist organizations have resulted in the removal of crosses,
Ten Commandment displays, and other Christian expressions from public property.
Veterans groups and military chaplains have been told they cannot pray in the
name of Jesus.
A
high school band in Mississippi was ordered by a judge to remove “How Great
Thou Art” from the repertoire of songs they played at football games and other
school events. This crusade to de-Christianize America came starkly out into
the open when President Barak Obama announced to a Turkish audience on April 6,
2009, “America is not a Christian nation.”
In
addition to the attack on Christian speech and symbols, there has been a
purposeful revising of America’s history, eliminating the stories of faith that
are so common in the nation’s founding. This attempt to redefine America by
rewriting her history is a vital part of the secularist goal to fundamentally transform
the America of Washington, Jefferson, Madison, and Lincoln.
Nations
derive their sense of identity from their history. Remove or revise a people’s
history and those people are then vulnerable to be molded into something new
and different. This is what Karl Marx was referring to when he wrote, “People
without a heritage are easily persuaded.”
The most recent attempt to redefine America by rewriting her past is the “1619 Project” of the New York Times. Supposedly instituted to commemorate the arrival of the first African slaves to America in 1619, their stated goal is to “reframe” American history by claiming that 1619, not 1776, represents the country’s true founding. America, therefore, is racist and corrupt at its very core and in need of fundamental change.
Slavery,
for sure, is a blight on America’s history. However, because of 1726, America
is not defined by what happened in 1619. The Great Awakening that began in 1726
broke down racial and cultural barriers and unleashed the spiritual and moral
forces that eventually brought an end to slavery in America.
Recovering
this truth about America’s history is critical, for as George Orwell said in
his classic book, 1984, “Whoever controls the past, controls the future.”
And commenting on the demise of nations in world history, Carl Sandburg, winner
of two Pulitzer Prizes, said,
When a nation goes down, or a society perishes, one condition may always be found; they forgot where they came from. They lost sight of what had brought them along (Hyatt, 1726: The Year that Defined America, 11).
Recovering the knowledge of what happened in 1726 is, therefore, of paramount importance. That year, a great, spiritual tsunami began that eventually engulfed Colonial America in a flood of religious fervor. This “Great Awakening” gave birth to an anti-slavery movement and had a direct bearing on the founding of the United States of America.
Yes, 1726 was the
year that defined America. Now, because the secularists have redefined America in their own image as a secularist, godless state, we must redefine her again as a land of faith and freedom, based on historical facts and what happened in 1726.
This article was derived from Dr. Eddie Hyatt's book, 1726: The Year that Defined America, available from Amazon and his website at http://eddiehyatt.com.