Happy Birthday U.S.A.!

So what are you doing to celebrate the birth of our nation?

     We normally have a gaudeamus day. But since the 4th this year falls on a Friday we will be having our regular Friday of Exposition of the Blessed Sacrament in the morning (a wonderful day to pray for our nation and the upcoming elections - God help us!) and a work afternoon with our Gaudeamus postponed to Saturday. We have a wonderful Liturgy of the Hours designed for this important day. We normally even put off some fireworks in the evening but since our dear missionaries are going to arrive ANY MOMENT (!) and our Sisters plus some volunteers will be busy working preparing their meals or cleaning up the next 13 days AND our postulant Sharon will be arriving Saturday evening to enter the monastery (!) we are going to bypass them this year. But fireworks are a lovely way to celebrate the birth of our beloved nation.

     About 10 years ago we purchased a set of videos from David Barton's Wallbuilders. (Please check out the website!) We have watched them over and over again. On these videos he tells the TRUE story of what was meant by "the wall of separation between Church and State" - forbidding government from establishing a national religion - and how this has been redefined to mean freedom from religious expression in public since the '50's and how it especially played out in the 1963 court case of removing prayer from school.

     On these videos he gives so much interesting info about how important the Christian faith was to the Fathers of our Nation. So many people say they were just Deists but that's really not true. Many of them really knew Jesus in a personal way and were true Christians. Mr. Barton states how in George Washington's Farewell Address he tells us what brought our Nation to success and what must be done to maintain it. He stated that religion and morality are inseparable and indispensable to patriotism! True patriotism flows from the Gift of piety.

     In 1787 during the Constitutional Congress Benjamen Franklin stated that a nation needs God and prayer. And that Individual accountability takes place in eternity but that national accountability will take place in the present. Nations answer to God in the present through either disasters or blessings. Mr. Barton has provided us with a wealth of truth about our Nation and its founding principles. He states that "God's people must be involved (in politics, education, etc.) to have God's principles in our nation." We have to get the truth out! This would make a great segue to our nations upcoming elections and our need to get out and share with people about the need to vote, etc. but I'll have to save that for another blog post! ;)

Praise the Power that hath made and preserved us a Nation!

Then conquer we must when our cause it is just.

In this be our motto, 'In God is our trust!

~ Frances Scott Key

     God bless each of you and may God bless America!

     Click here for an historical 7 min. video about our national anthem - The Star Spangled Banner