FAITH AND THE SUPREME COURT

IS IT APPROPRIATE TO CONSIDER “FAITH” IN
THE SELECTION OF SUPREME COURT JUSTICES?

The fact that we are asking this question reveals what Bill Bennett called the dumbing down of America- concerning knowledge of our government and institutions. This should be a no-brainer

ARTICLE VI OF THE CONSTITUTION STATES CLEARLY THAT THERE IS TO BE NO RELIGIOUS TEST TO HOLD OFFICE.
So when liberals like Chucky Schumer hammered people like Bill Pryor and Charles Pickering for their “deeply held religious beliefs” he was acting in direct violation of the Constitution. The reason we’re debating this issue is because liberals want to apply a religious test that says “If you’re a real Christian who really believes the Bible, then we don’t want you in office because we don’t like what you might think about abortion and gay rights.” That’s what the whole argument is about, and that religious test is expressly prohibited by the Constitution.

SECONDLY, THERE IS NO PROHIBITION OF CONSIDERING ONE’S FAITH WHEN SELECTING A SUPREME COURT JUSTICE.
The President has every right to select whoever he wants, and in selecting one who holds a similar faith and worldview to his own he is more assured that they will see the Constitution as he sees it. Generally speaking, people of traditional Judeo-Christian faith make better public servants than pagans or atheists because…

OUR INSTITUTIONS HAVE BEEN FASHIONED BY AND MAINTAIN THEIR INTEGRITY BY OUR JUDEO-CHRISTIAN WORLDVIEW.
That’s why in the Supreme Court building there are no less than twenty depictions of Moses and the Ten Commandments including the one right over the Chief Justices chair to remind him that even the Chief Justice is under a higher law and his judgments must conform to the judgments of the Supreme Judge of the Universe. (Such was the teachings of James Wilson, signer of both the Declaration and the Constitution, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court and Father of American Law Schools)

That’s why the court clerk cries out in the beginning of session “God save the U.S. and this honorable court.”

That’s why witnesses before the court swear on the Bible to tell the truth.

That’s why the court is closed on Sundays, the Christian Sabbath, the Lord’s Day.

Our faith is not in human wisdom, but in the superintending providence of God that watches over our leaders and our institutions and favors us with the blessings of liberty and justice.

John Adams taught us that there is no constitution that can control the vices of men without the laws of God written upon their hearts….”Our constitution was made only for a moral and religious people; it is wholly inadequate to the governing of any other,” he said.

More recently, President Gerald Ford told us that without God there could be no American form of government nor an American way of life.

Our system of justice and law is rooted in the idea that our rights are not given to us by the generosity if the state but by the hand of God, as JFK reminded us. That’s why the Declaration calls them “inalienable,” because only God can take those rights away, and last I looked he wasn’t dressed in black robes.

It is the job of government to secure those rights given by God. If government grants rights then those rights are no longer inalienable, because what the government can give it can also take away.

If you take God out of the equation you remove the stability and consistency that has preserved our democratic republic for over 200 years, a feat unheard of in world history. It works because we’re not subject to the whims of popular opinion; we are ruled by eternal principles derived from the Book we swear on.

That’s why James Madison, the chief architect of the Constitution said that we have staked the future of American civilization not on the power of government, but on the power of each of us to govern ourselves according to the Ten Commandments of God.

That’s why our motto is “in God we trust” not in the wisdom of humanity we trust.

So in short there are two points to remember:

There must be no religious test – That’s expressly prohibited by the Constitution.
The President is free to, and would be wise to select people of faith as Supreme Court Justices because people of faith make better judges, because they understand and accept the principles of justice and mercy upon which our systems and institutions were established and upon which they find their permanency and success.

NOTE: IT IS IMPOSSIBLE TO SEPARATE FAITH FROM GOVERNMENT
Faith is the very atmosphere in which we operate. We do not operate in a vacuum.

Every government instituted among men is rooted in a religious worldview, whether it be theistic like western Christianity, or Atheistic like the former Soviet Union

The question is “Which faith will we operate in, faith in God and His Word as well as we can understand it, or faith in humanity alone which was recognized by the Supreme Court as the religion of Secular Humanism (Torcaso v. Watkins)?

SHOULD CHURCHES BE REIMBURSED BY FEMA?

The question about reimbursement by FEMA presents a particular quandary for those in Church leadership; on the one hand the church shouldn’t be looking to the Government for our provision, because that in effect gives the Government power over the Church to some degree, yet on the other hand religious organizations shouldn’t be discriminated against simply because they are religious.

Religion isn’t what’s wrong with America; it’s what’s right with America, and it should be encouraged and supported in general by our public policy.

What we do as a Church we do in response to the law of love, which by definition, is sacrifice. We live to give, not to take. Jesus taught us and we’ve found it to be true, “It is better to give than to receive.” We don’t live by the law of the jungle.

So what we do, we do whether FEMA would reimburse us or not, because we know we’ve already received the greatest gift of all in the gift of God’s Son, Jesus Christ which grants us citizenship in the City of God.

But we are also citizens of the city of man, and when we look from the perspective of Government and Public policy, there should be no discrimination, particularly against the organizations that do the best job in helping those in need.

Any attempt to separate religious groups from secular non-profit groups performing the same mission reflects not a preference or even neutrality toward religion, but rather hostility toward religion.

That’s why at the forefront of this move you find groups like the American Atheists, and Americans for Separation of Church and State and the ACLU (The anti-Christian liberties Union).

These groups are fundamentally un-American at their core; their primary agenda is to bring a revolution so that we would be no longer one nation under God, but rather many nations under man. This is Secular Humanism, a religion that sets man as the highest authority, and is more consistent with communism and fascism, than it is with Americanism. Remember, our national motto is “In God We Trust”

It was President Eisenhower who said, and it was later repeated by President Ford,

“Without God there could be no American form of government, nor an American way of life. Recognition of the Supreme Being is the first –the most basic- expression of Americanism”

So I guess the conclusion of the matter should be that the Government should not discriminate against the Church in considering reimbursements, and the Church will always have the freedom to accept or not to accept Government reimbursements knowing that we are accountable not to the Federal Government, but to the Supreme Judge of the Universe for its faithful stewardship.