'We need our Creator every second of every day'
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A pair of GOP governors are doing their part to turn the tide of a decades-long systematic Marxist movement to remove God from public life by placing God first.
Against an increasingly anti-Christian national backdrop, Republican governor Bill Lee of Tennessee has signed a measure calling for 30 days of prayer and fasting beginning July 1 in the Volunteer State.
The resolution lists the various miseries afflicting the people of the state. It acknowledges that these tribulations cannot be lifted without, first, the intervention and favor of God.
According to the document, the various sufferings the people of the state are enduring include:
A letter accompanying the document begins with 2 Chronicles 7:14, a verse that resonates throughout the entire resolution:
"If my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and I will forgive their sin and will heal their land."
Governor Lee urges churches across Tennessee's 95 counties to read the resolution aloud during Sunday services on June 30.
It further asks individual citizens to:
Souls and Liberty contacted Tennessee's three Catholic dioceses — Nashville, Memphis and Knoxville — asking if the governor's resolution would be read in Catholic churches on Sunday. Two did not reply (as of publication time), and one said it wasn't aware of the governor's initiative.
IN GOD WE MUST TRUST
In 2023, Tennessee passed another piece of legislation that places God first.
The law, proposed by State Representative John Holsclaw (R-4th District), added the words "In God We Trust" to the state seal. He said the "addition aligns with the deeply rooted faith-based values of Tennessee and will serve as a visual representation of the state's commitment to trust in a Higher Power."
According to the Pew Research Center, Tennessee is the third most religious state in the US, with 73% of residents identifying as "highly religious" and 81% of adults identifying as Christian.
Another pro-Christian initiative occurred elsewhere in the South this week.
In Louisiana, Republican Gov. Jeff Landry signed legislation on Wednesday that requires the Ten Commandments to be displayed on posters in "large, easily readable font" in all public classrooms, from kindergarten to state-funded universities.
"If you want to respect the rule of law, you've got to start from the original lawgiver, which was Moses, who got the commandments from God," Landry said.
State funds will not be used to implement the mandate; instead the posters will be paid for through donations. Even so, the governor is being hit with an onslaught of criticism and lawsuits by atheist and anti-religious factions for his measure.
Proponents argue the law is not merely religious but bears historical significance. They say the Ten Commandments is seen as the fundamental legal code of Western Civilization and the Common Law of the United States
Other state officials, including those in Texas, Oklahoma and Utah, are considering bills requiring the Ten Commandments to be displayed in public classrooms. Threats of legal battles over the measures, however, are halting their progress.
MEN HAVE FORGOTTEN GOD
Governors Lee and Landry, and others like them, are pushing back against the removal of God from US public life that began decades ago. From the banning of prayer and Bible-reading in the public schools, to clergy being barred from instructing children on state property, to silencing team prayers before school sporting events – the move to the dark side is evident. The results of removing God from public view have been disastrous.
Russian author Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, who survived almost a decade of imprisonment inside Communist gulags, explained what happens when people eliminate God from everyday life.
Upon receiving an award in the US in 1983 for his efforts in documenting the horror of the Soviet Revolution, most notably in his almost-2000-page tome The Gulag Archipelago, Solzhenitsyn said:
Tennessee has invited "all those who are physically able and spiritually inclined to do so to join in a thirty-day season of prayer and intermittent fasting." It is an opportunity for all Americans, as Gov. Lee puts it, "to receive His Grace and Mercy transforming ourselves, our communities, our State, and our Nation."
Amen.
Dr. Barbara Toth has a doctorate in rhetoric and composition from Bowling Green State University. She has taught at universities in the US, China and Saudi Arabia. Her work in setting up a writing center at Princess Nourah bint Abdulrahmen University, an all-women's university in Riyadh, has been cited in American journals. Toth has published academic and non-academic articles and poems internationally.
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