Who Said?

Let's play a game. Who said:

Our form of government has no sense unless it is founded in a deeply felt religious faith.

The quote is from Dwight D. Eisenhower after his second inauguration. Eisenhower was the only president to ever be baptized while in office. He classified himself as a Christian. He held a deeply felt religious faith. And he followed the statement above with "and I don’t care what it is." It is indeed true that our form of government cannot be maintained without a deeply felt religious faith, but not just any religious faith will do. The secret to a functional democracy is an intrinsically moral society, only possible in a Christian society.

Okay, next one. Who said:

Our job is not to ask that God respond to our notion of truth — our job is to be true to Him, His word, and His commandments.

The quote comes from President Barack Obama at the prayer breakfast so irksome to so many where he compared Christianity and the Crusades to Islamic fundamentalists (although, of course, he never used that term). The president spent 20 years at the Trinity United Church of Christ under, for many years, Jeremiah Wright, who preached, among other things, strong forms of racism against whites and Jews and that 9/11 was retribution to white America. In that quote above the president was absolutely correct. Unfortunately, he makes a practice, as does a large portion of America, of asking God to respond to our notions of truth rather than simply accepting truth from His Word.

Both statements were accurate, but outcomes were mistaken. What a pity. In both cases.