First, a little story to set the scene.  The father was driving his son home after church.

“How was Sunday school?” he asked.

“Oh, it was great, Dad.  A war story:  Moses had given Pharaoh a hard time and, finally, Pharaoh says, ‘Okay you can take your people and get out of here.’  So Moses is leading the Israelites out of Egypt, but Pharaoh changes his mind and goes after the Israelites with his huge army and catches up to them just as they get to the Red Sea.  But there aren’t any bridges or escape routes, so Moses gets on his walkie-talkie and calls for air support, and the planes come zooming down and” –

The father, who hadn’t been paying attention, suddenly interrupts and says, “Wait a minute!  Wait a minute!  WAIT A MINUTE!  Is that how the Sunday School teacher told the story?”

“No, Dad, it really isn’t, but if I told it like she did, you’d never believe it!”

Well, friends, the story I have to tell you is so different from deeply rooted suppositions, it also will be hard to believe, but, fasten your seatbelts, and we’ll have a go at it.

Sixty-seven years ago America was devastated by the attack on Pearl Harbor.  The fabric of daily life had been torn to shreds.  Much has been said about our troops who fought and won that war.  “The Greatest Generation” they have been called, but the reality was much larger and grander than that.  The history of the whole nation in those four years was a marvel of patriotism, courage, self-sacrifice, good-will and cooperation.

For a long time after Pearl Harbor the war news was not good.  There were continuing enemy advances and victories.  The Japanese invaded Thailand and the Malay Peninsula.  They sank the British Battleship Prince of Wales and the battle cruiser Repulse and were able to move on to capture Singapore.  They took Guam and Wake Island and captured the Philippines.  On May 6, 1942, General Wainwrite and his 11,500 troops on Corregidor surrendered to the Japanese.  That same month General Rommel captured Tobruk, a critical supply port in North Africa and moved into Egypt.  The following month, the Germans began sweeping into Russia, capturing a number of cities.  They crossed the Don River and began the Siege of Stalingrad.  Meanwhile, the Luftwaffe continued the air war known as the Battle of Britain, bombing London and other key targets that had been blacked out and under attack for two years.

In America, there were no significant groups claiming that we shouldn’t have fought Germany, that Japan, alone, was more than we could handle, or second-guessing the military strategy, or clamoring for us to surrender and bring our troops home.  With scarcely any visible dissent the people of America adapted their lives, and warmly joined hands in meeting the escalating demands of the war, and sympathetically providing support to the families of troops who were killed or captured or wounded.

Life in America was very different in 1941.  I don’t have to rummage around in newspaper archives or sort through history books to dig out the information about life in America in 1941.  I was there.  Pearl Harbor happened while I was in my second year of college.  Most of my classmates had two parents, and if not, one was deceased.  In those days, divorce was infrequent and a source of embarrassment to those who terminated their marriage.  It was assumed that people belonged to a church or synagogue.  God was sacred so that profanity had no place in mainstream literature or entertainment.  The respect for each other’s religion was such that no large party or public event was held on Friday evening that did not include a fish entrée for Roman Catholics for whom, at that time, Friday was a meatless day.  Each morning at the public school I had attended, all the students and teachers came to an assembly before classes began.  First there was a prayer followed by a patriotic song.  Then a teacher or administrator would read a passage about heroic patriotism or an act of generosity or about some other inspirational topic.

The family was the central core of life.  Its solidarity had been tested and, for many, strengthened during the Great Depression, when all generations had to work together to put food on the table, and sacrifice together, making do without accustomed purchases, services and entertainment.  Life was lived with the assumption that the strangers you encountered had no intention of cheating or harming you.  When I was eight years old, I would walk my younger brother after dark a half mile across a park and a railroad track to a program at the Community House.  My parents had no reason to worry about our safety.  When we went into Chicago, we left the parked car unlocked and if the driver forgot to take the car keys with him, car and keys and packages would all be there when we returned.

I served in a tank battalion in the First Infantry Division.  Our battalion had been drafted from the state of Illinois, so many of the troops came from families of modest means.  Like my college classmates, the soldiers, mostly, had two parents and belonged to a church.  We were under enemy fire almost constantly for the eleven months from D-Day to VE-Day.  Only a couple of our soldiers had an emotional breakdown, known then as combat fatigue, during that stressful period.  In those days, Americans were an emotionally sturdy people.

Now we come to a large question.  Does anyone seriously believe that that so-called “Greatest Generation” miraculously sprang from nowhere as an honest courageous, hard-working, self-sacrificing, cooperative, thoroughly patriotic people who persevered in the face of unceasing military set-backs?  I doubt it.  During the war the people simply behaved according to the traditions and standards of behavior that prevailed in America at that time.  That succeeding generations should be surprised by how Americans performed in World War II reveals an appalling lapse in our educational system.

As far as I have been able to discover, our schools and colleges, for at least seventy years, have not informed their students that Christianity was the dominant influence in the development of our nation and of our society.  The character of the American people in 1941 simply reflected the then current stage in the long evolution of Christendom in America.  Christendom does not imply that everyone is a Christian.  What it does signify is that most people, regardless of their beliefs about religion, live their lives according to the standards of behavior advocated by Christ.  Think of the features I have mentioned – marriage as the dominant norm, church membership for most, living without fear of strangers, the daily school assembly and so on.  The way of life in 1941 was Christendom embodied to a degree unmatched in any other nation.

Let’s look back now to the year 1620 when the Pilgrims arrived in Massachusetts.  You may remember that Jesus, at the Last Supper, said to his disciples, “Peace I leave with you.  My peace I give to you.”  That is a startling promise.  In the coming years of their ministry, the disciples would encounter hostility, threats, imprisonment, torture and death.  The story of their evangelism is anything but peaceful, but Christ, after bestowing His peace on them went on to say, “Not as the world giveth, give I unto you.  Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.”  The Peace of Christ was not a harmony among individuals, nor harmony among groups.  It was, instead, an armor of spiritual protection against all adverse circumstances, warding off fear and worry.  “Let not your heart be troubled.  Neither let it be afraid,” Jesus said.

When the Pilgrims finally boarded the Mayflower in 1620, with the sole purpose of finding a place to live where they could practice their Christian faith without governmental interference, it was a courageous venture.  Imagine, putting your wife and children on a small, crowded ship for a two-month trip across the soon-to-be wintry Atlantic ocean.  Over and over, attempts to found colonies in America by England, France and Spain had failed, in some cases because of disease or starvation; in others, because of Indian attacks; other colonies were destroyed or taken over by military action when one European nation tried to get rid of another’s colonies.  The voyage itself was perilous.  Columbus lost two ships in his four journeys to America.

Just starting a colony in the new world was a dangerous and arduous undertaking.  The Pilgrims landed at Plymouth, Massachusetts in November.  During the first winter fifty-one of the hundred and two colonists died.  Yet when spring came and the Mayflower returned to England, not a single Pilgrim was aboard.  Those early settlers had to make their own lumber and build their houses, fashion their own furniture, build a church and a school, grow their crops and care for their children.

Here is a quotation from an early history.

The strict observance of the Sabbath was, perhaps, the most striking characteristic of the colony.  Work ceased on Saturday after three o’clock, and the rest of the day was spent in learning the catechism and preparing for the Sabbath.  The morning of the Sabbath was begun by home worship and then at 9 o’clock, the Meetinghouse bell summoned every citizen to public service, only the sick and disabled being excused.  The Meetinghouse was a crude, humble structure built of logs chinked with clay or moss, with a thatched roof.  It was surrounded by a stone wall for protection against a sudden attack by Indians.  Every man above eighteen years of age brought his firearm to church, and sentinels paced their beat outside during the church service.  The service was long and solemn… About two in the afternoon a second service was begun.  At sunset the Sabbath ended!

Can anyone doubt that it was the Peace of Christ, that sure armor against worry and fear, which fortified the decisions to go to America and persist in the plan to found a colony in the wilderness?  Was the World War II generation greater than the Pilgrims?

Let’s take a look at another generation, the one that created the American government a hundred and sixty years later.  The British oppression of the colonies had become ever more intolerable, so in September of 1774 the colonies convened a Continental Congress to try to persuade King George to acknowledge the rights of the British citizens overseas, and ease up on the harsh laws, taxes and restrictions imposed by Britain and enforced by British troops stationed in the colonies.  The King ignored their petition.  Seven months after that plea was sent to England, colonial militia attacked a column of British troops on its way to seize a colonial munitions depot in Concord, Massachusetts.  In the battles at Lexington and Concord ninety-five colonists and two hundred ninety-three British troops were killed.

The Continental Congress, realizing war was inevitable created a Continental Army of the colonial militia and named George Washington Commander-in-Chief.  The members of the Congress had the good sense to take an oath of secrecy, for if word leaked out about the critical issues being discussed, the people would try to mobilize public passions for or against items of contention and the work of the Congress would be hopelessly compromised, so they did an amazing thing.  They took a solemn oath not to breathe one word to anyone about what was said in their deliberations.

Here are excerpts of that oath:

Resolved that every member of this Congress considers himself under the ties of virtue, honor and love of country, not to divulge, directly or indirectly, any matter or thing agitated or debated in Congress…  And that if any member shall violate this agreement, he shall be expelled from this Congress and deemed an enemy to the liberties of America.

Nobody broke that pledge.  Can you imagine our Congress taking such an oath and abiding by it?  The Continental Congress then proceeded to draw up a document of secession.  The Declaration of Independence was drafted by Thomas Jefferson with the assistance of Benjamin Franklin and John Adams.  The Congress added one phrase to the last sentence, “with a firm reliance on Divine Providence” and adopted the text.  It was America’s Continental Congress that added that phrase.

The fifty-six men who signed the Declaration, publicly proclaiming their role in the rejection of British rule, put themselves in great jeopardy.  They had pledged their lives, their fortunes and their sacred honor in support of The Declaration of Independence.  Listen to what T.R. Fehrenbach in his book, Greatness to Spare, tells in a concluding summary of the consequences for those dauntless fifty-six signers.

     Nine signers died of wounds or hardships during the Revolutionary War.  Five were captured or imprisoned, in some cases with brutal treatment.  The wives, sons and daughters of others were killed, jailed, mistreated or left penniless.  Several lost everything they owned.  Every signer was proscribed as a traitor; every one was hunted.  Most were offered immunity, freedom, rewards or the release of loved ones to break their pledged word, or to take the King’s protection.  Their fortunes were forfeit, but their honor was not.  No signer defected or changed his stand through the darkest hours.  Their honor, like the nation remained intact.

Those men were not foolish or naïve.  Like the Pilgrims, they understood the peril of their actions.  Like the Pilgrims, they were, I believe, armed with the Peace of Christ.  Meanwhile the Continental Army, greatly outnumbered by highly-trained, well-equipped troops had all the odds against them.  Partially trained, assembled from scattered colonies, they lacked sufficient weapons, ammunition, supplies, food and clothing.  And yet they persisted and won a victory.

The drafting of a Constitution was an exceedingly difficult task. 

The debate about how the states should be represented in the new government became so heated between the large states and the small states that some delegates withdrew from the Convention.  In the midst of the angry, tense argumentation, Benjamin Franklin stood up and gave a crucial speech.  Here are excerpts.

     Mr. President, the small progress we have made after four or five weeks…our different sentiments on almost every question, several of the last producing as many noes as ayes, is, methinks a melancholy proof of the imperfection of Human Understanding.  We indeed seem to feel our own want of political wisdom, and we have been running in search of it… How has it happened, sir, that we have not once thought of humbly applying to the Father of Lights to illuminate our understanding?

     In the beginning of our contest with Great Britain, when we were sensible of danger, we had daily prayer in this room for Divine Protection.  Our prayers, sir, were heard and were graciously answered…

     I therefore beg leave to move that henceforth prayers imploring the assistance of Heaven… be held in this assembly every morning before we proceed to business and that one or more clergy of this city be requested to officiate at the service.

The members of the Convention were deeply moved.  His motion was adopted and daily prayers began.  One delegate wrote that when they assembled the next day, every unfriendly feeling had been expelled and a spirit of conciliation had been cultivated. 

Here are a few comments about the new government.

President John Quincy Addams:  The highest glory of the American Revolution was this – It connected in one indissoluble bond the principles of civil government with the principles of Christianity.

President James Madison wrote:  “We have staked the whole future of American civilization, not upon the power of government, far from it.  We have staked the future of all our political institutions upon the capacity of mankind for self-government, upon the capacity of each and all of us to govern ourselves according to the Ten Commandments of God.”  Was the World War II generation greater than that which founded our nation?

Before moving on to some concluding thoughts about the forces that have aggressively fought to demonize religion and drive it from the public square, I want to cite an irrefutable proof that the United States Government still embraced and acted on its Christian heritage in the first two decades of the Twentieth Century, for it gave to each soldier going overseas in World War I a New Testament for his knapsack.  The federal government had judged that Holy Scripture would be an invaluable support for its soldiers.

Now we turn to the intensive campaign to discredit Christendom and exclude government from any involvement with religion:  In every society there will always be individuals and groups that struggle to eliminate standards of behavior.  There is a certain egotistical personality that chafes at any restriction on human conduct and is intolerant of any source of such restrictions.  In America, starting in 1620, and extending through three hundred years, those who wished to do away with Christian standards of conduct faced an uphill battle because what they were trying to eliminate were principles commended by the Bible and so they couldn’t generate much of a following.

In the early twentieth century, however, socialist and Marxist radicalism were rapidly gaining power in America.  The Socialist Party elected fifty-six mayors and tallied 900,000 presidential votes in the 1912 election.  The Communist Party, activated in 1919 became the leading revolutionary Party in the United States and the most powerful force in the attack on Christianity.

Solzhenitsyn in his address accepting the Templeton Prize reported that all revolutionaries must labor to destroy religion.  The following passage is from that address:

     It was Dostoyevski…who drew from the French Revolution and its seething hatred of the Church the lesson that revolution must necessarily begin with atheism.  That is absolutely true.  But the world had never known before a godlessness so organized, militarized and tenaciously malevolent as that of Marx and Lenin, and at the heart of their psychology, hatred of God is the principal guiding force, more fundamental than all their political and economic pretensions.

This is a natural feature of revolution for if the people have a fixed and cherished allegiance to God, the revolutionaries must destroy, or, at least discredit and smother that allegiance.  Revolution cannot tolerate any authority superior to its own.  Communist Russia used severely oppressive and cruel measures trying to eradicate the Eastern Orthodox religion, its places of worship and its parishioners.  It also used extreme cruelty trying to eliminate the institution of the family, which was another authority with a superior claim to allegiance.

In the 1960’s, cultural radicals came to dominate and overwhelm opinion-making in America, and have gathered steam over the last four decades, so that the separation of church and state, which was never written into the Constitution, is now almost universally accepted as an historical requirement of our free society.  Nothing could be further from the truth.  Remember John Quincy Adams?  “The American Revolution connected in one indissoble bond the principles of civil government with the principles of Christianity.”  Here are excerpts from a report to Congress by the House Judiciary Committee in 1854:  “At the adoption of the Constitution…every state…provided as regularly for the support of the Church as for the support of the government… Had the people, during the Revolution, had a suspicion of any attempt to wage war against Christianity, the Revolution would have been strangled in its cradle.”  That from a report to Congress by the House Judiciary Committee.

As I recall, a series of polls some years ago revealed that a substantial majority of university professors and members of the media were not active members of a church.  Universities have hired Marxist faculty members for a long time, but during the Sixties, hiring one of the top revolutionary leaders such as Herbert Marcuse, Angela Davis, William Ayres or H. Bruce Franklin became a mark of distinction.  Let us put that appalling fact into perspective.

Until World War II, the United States, like all other societies, primitive or advanced, recognized that the primary and essential purpose of education had to be to train each new generation how to live responsibly in its own society.  Each new generation needed to be taught the ideals and principles of the society and the obligations and taboos that must be observed to sustain the ideals and principles.  Everything else was extra.  According to that supreme obligation, the enlistment of a professor committed to destroying our government simply could not have happened.  The radical forces have managed to eradicate in our country that worldwide concept of education and much of the credit for that devastating achievement is due to their massive campaign to deChristianize America.

Let me close with a quotation to remember, and a comment about my book.

James Russell Lowell, a Harvard professor, was one of the wisest and most highly esteemed figures of 19^th Century America.  He was a poet and essayist, he edited the Atlantic Monthly and he served as Ambassador to Spain and Britain.  He was once asked by François Guizot the Premier of France, “How long will the American Republic endure?”  Lowell replied, “As long as the ideas of the men who founded it remain dominant.”

A good part of this commentary has been drawn from my book Christianity:  Lifeblood of America’s Free Society (1620-1945).  It is my hope that this little volume can be an instrument for spreading understanding to the modern generations of Americans who are to put it bluntly, cultural orphans, orphans who have never been told about their heritage of Christianity, the foremost influence in the development of the American nation and of the American society, an influence that once made the United States of America the wonder and the envy of the world.