At the origin of our nation’s birth and identity is the role religion plays in forming a moral people capable of self-governance in our democratic republic. Our Constitution protects against both a state established religion and against attempts to impede religious practice.
Suspicion of religion in the public square
damages the origin and the founding
values of our national life.
Contentious debate about rights (the right to life, the definition of marriage, bodily autonomy, etc.) springs from a type of societal amnesia that a higher authority is the source of our unalienable rights.
Man does not make these rights for himself.
Man cannot radically alter them.
To be American is to hold that our unalienable rights are above any government and any man. This is true whether one professes a religion or not, or whether one is zealous in practicing faith or not. Otherwise we have no stable rights at all. Celebrating American independence should extend beyond the last parade and the last firework display on July 4.
Patriotism teaches awareness of the national family value of the role of religion in public life for how it forms a people of virtue and creates the possibility of enduring freedom.
Fr. Hamilton is a Catholic priest serving in Edmond, and is the chairman of the Board of Directors of the OCPAC Foundation (Original Constitutional Principles Affecting Culture).
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