Has Destiny placed America as a city on a hill? The quotation, of course, is famous --- right out of the telegenic idealism of Ronald Reagan, our "Great Communicator" of the eighties. But the quote was hardly original with the conservative Reagan. It was a cliche in the colonial days of New England, and it actually comes from the Gospel. Reagan, so beloved by that other actor -- the conservative (anti-communist) Pope John Paul II, certainly knew theatrics as a young man and budding thespian. You showcase the star of the production: You highlight the prima ballerina. When Jesus said it, the allusion was apparently to Jerusalem, the City Set On a Hill.

The City Set upon a hill is a phrase associated with John Winthrop's sermon, "A Model of Christian Charity," given in 1630. The phrase is derived from the metaphor of Salt and Light in the Sermon on the Mount of Jesus given in the Gospel of Matthew. Winthrop warned the Puritan colonists of New England who were to found the Massachusetts Bay Colony that their new community would be a "city on a hill," watched by the world:

For we must consider that we shall be as a city upon a hill. The eyes of all people are upon us. So that if we shall deal falsely with our God in this work we have undertaken...we shall be made a story and a by-word throughout the world. We shall open the mouths of enemies to speak evil of the ways of God...We shall shame the faces of many of God's worthy servants, and cause their prayers to be turned into curses upon us til we be consumed out of the good land whither we are going.

A closely related metaphor which Jesus used almost in the same breath is that of the candle. "Ye are the light of the world. A city that is set on an hill cannot be hid. Neither do men light a candle, and put it under a bushel, but on a candlestick; and it giveth light unto all that are in the house. Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven." (see Matt 5:14).

Hierosolyma Jerusalem (roughly Yerushalayim in Hebrew). What is it about building cities high on a hill, or in a lifted, conspicuous vantage point. Jerusalem was so built. The word Zion, the City of David, alludes to the conspicuous or lofty placement in relation to surrounding terrain. It is situated on a ridge 2,500 ft (760 m) high.

She is compared to an attractive young woman. In the Canticles (Song of Solomon) we read: We have a little sister, and she hath no breasts: what shall we do for our sister in the day when she shall be spoken for? If she be a wall, we will build upon her a palace of silver: and if she be a door, we will inclose her with boards of cedar." [Canticles 8: 8,9] Like the bella donna of a Broadway Show, the diva, the prima donna -- what do we do? We lead with her beauty and splendor. We "put our best foot forward."

Is this what Destiny is doing for America. In order that she may shine in all her joy and light and beauty, is Destiny lacing the candle on the candlestick, showcasing her witness in all the resplendent glory of which she is capable?

What hath God wrought?

Barack Obama reminds us: "America is the greatest country on earth ... [pause] ... but it didn't just happen on its own." Isn't this an implied imperative to we the living? The high duty or honor incumbent on us to live up to the awesome heritage that Obama alluded to?. See Exceptionalism, America's Destiny, and the unprecedented election of a son of Africa (to the presidency of the United States). IMPOSSIBLE. You say. (Yes, but it happened.) As the Yiddish used to say, Only in America

A century ago, a great spiritual leader particularly called upon the Uniitted States of America to lead the way to world peace. [Bahá'u'lláh, founder of the Bahá'í faith. See Marzieh Gail's The Sheltering Branch]

America - the Last Best Hope of Earth

President Lincoln called America the last best hope of earth. A month before he signed the Emancipation Proclamation, Lincoln's "whole soul" was absorbed in his plan of gradual remunerated emancipation. Going to some length he again pleaded for something less disruptive (that, additionally would be voluntary).

In giving freedom to the slave, we assure freedom to the free -- honorable alike in what we give, and what we preserve. We shall nobly save, or meanly lose, the last best hope of earth. Other means may succeed; this could not fail. The way is plain, peaceful, generous, just -- a way which, if followed, the world will forever applaud, and God must forever bless.

In more recent times, Malcolm X once declared that only God can save America's racial problem. It is, after all, a problem of the heart. Perhaps relevant is a discussion by Jacob Needleman {in The American Soul):

For George Washington and for many of the Founding Fathers -- I believe this holds true for Jefferson as well -- the idea of freedom of religion opens up in ways that are not what is usually thought. Freedom of religion means not only the liberty to practice whatever religion one chooses. It also means that genuine freedom must, freely and naturally, lead toward and be based upon the religious dimension.

A religion that is not freely chosen is not religion; and a freedom that is not in the deepest sense religious is not freedom.
The present age has tended to emphasize the first half of this proposition and has neglected the second half. [Needleman p132]

Recommended:   Plea For Liberty (Learned Hand)

Can we all just get along?

Rodney King, a lowly American caught in the cauldron of inner city despair and his own human addictions, uttered a brief remark which verily shines with prfound and enduring wisdom, "Can we all just get along?" It has been said that strife rips apart the human family, that sibling rivalry destoys brotherly concord. America is a tune and it must be sung together. Yet another horny dilemma of human existence. Competition brings out the best in us. Or does it? Sometimes competition brings out the worst in us. America may be a symphony, but there can be no harmony if we all sing the same notes.

Do you remember the sixties' song: "I'd like to teach the world to sing in perfect harmony."

Doesn't the fighting get old. after a while?

The following is from Dr. Bob Hieronimus

Neither Red States Nor Blue States

"America is destined to lay the foundation for world peace and global unity. We can encourage this by remembering that we are not the people of a city or state. We are not the people from the east or west coasts of America. We are people from the planet Earth. We are Earth People.

"Ye Are Brethren"

The New Atlantis

Alexis de Tocqueville wrote about early America during the Jackson era and spoke glowingly of the hustle-and-bustle of the yankees, the essentially middle-class, broadly literate society he saw not just in New England, but west of there as well, lands settled by New Englanders. Tocqueville praised their biblical faith, even when tinged with overtly ardent aspects. He was positively impressed that the schooling, though modest by Old World aristocratic standards, was open to everyone, even girls. The South, which reminded him so much of Old Europe, he predicted would one day imitate the North (and beinning with the close of the Civil War, it has); and he predicted that one day the entire globe would emulate America.

The New Atlantis

magnus ab integro saecculorum nascitur ordo.
iam redit et virgo, redeunt saturnia regna
iam nova progenies caelo demittitur alto.

[vergil, eclogues]

the new atlantis

Psalm 118:22
The Chief Cornerstone
The Stone Which the Builders Rejected

Spiritual writer Annalee Skarin notes The soul is not developed [from the outside] any more than the physical body will develop and grow by rubbing the food on the outside. Growth is always from within. And if a child can be trained in the principles of LOVE and kindness and appreciation and service as it is taught to worship Godin a glory of vibrating nearnness then the "Chief Corner Stone" will no longer be a rejected factor of their lives. That Chief Corner Stone is portrayed in all the inspired drawings of that Great Pyramid of Gezah, in Egypt. Its chief corner stone, or cap stone, was truly REJECTED BY THE BUILDERS, even as man's has been. It is a temple of unimaginable wonder. There are hidden, sacred rooms, sealed up and waiting for a generation that will be willing to live the higher laws of Jesus Christ and who are worthy to receive the unspeakable truths through the purification and sanctification of their lives. The chief corner stone of that sacred monument of stone was rejected by the builders in the true symbology of man's individual rejection of the revelations of truth and power as he fails to open up the Superconscious mind to that divine contact with God. Yet under the inspiration of Almighty God, that sacred symbol was selected as on side of the seal of this great nation, which is meant to stand forth as a democracy of freedom and hope and Light to the whole world. That glorious seal of the United States of America was chosen under the direct hand of God and is engraved to be placed on all official documents of this land. In the seal, as in the ancient records that rejected capstone is suspended just above the pyramid, with an eye -- "THE ALL-SEEING EYE" of everlasting Truth and Knowledge and Power suspended above it, waiting to be accepted and put into place. The other side of that seal is the Eagle -- symbol of everlasting life (the foinix ). Or as Isaiah said: "They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles: they shall run, and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint." The Book of Books. p118, 119 The mystery of the Great Seal

---

How did the Americans do it?

Oriana Fallaci writes:
They did it with a piece of paper that, along with the need of the soul, the need to have a homeland, put into effect the sublime idea of liberty -- or rather of liberty married to quality. The Declaration of Independence. "We hold these Truths to be self -- evident: that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness; that, to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men..." And that piece of paper that we Europeans have all been copying well or badly from the French Revolution on, or from which we've drawn our inspiration, is still the backbone of America.

---

Transcending even the evil

Eldridge Cleaver writes:

In vain the assassination of John F. Kennedy, in vain the assassination of Martin Luther King

"this nation -- bourgeois or not, imperialist or not, murderous or not -- its people, somewhere in their butchered and hypocritical souls, still contain an epic potential of spirit which is its hope, a bottomless potential which fires the imagination of its youth."

And that, says Cleaver, was the meaning of Martin Luther King. THAT was the meaning of the March on Washington (August 28, 1963). THAT was the meaning of King's "I Have a Dream" sermon -- and exhortation to the America he believed in. [Soul on Ice, 1968]

---

Oh, we are weary pilgrims;
to this wilderness we bring--
a Church without a bishop,
a State without a King.

America - against all the odds

How could it have happened, the American survival. They broke all the rules. When they first began their great experiment, no European state would have dared such a radical experiment -- to trust the average citizen with self-rule. For some reason it worked for these Americans. Voltaire thought it was the sheer democracy itself, praising the brazenness of commoners like Franklin and the bustling Philadelphians. A century later Tocqueville discovered a surprising conservatism in yankee Democracy's liberal premise, and stressed the indispensability of their virtuous women, and the balancing role of the churches -- somehow harmonizing liberalism and traditionalism. Still later, Henri Bergson went further still. Left and Right were both essential, just as Equality and Liberty are both essential. But mediating between Equality and Liberty is a third something, a tertium quid, which is FRATERNITY. This is the spiritual role played by faith and values. America thrives because of the strategic healing function which America's deeply entrenched religiosity (not necessarily the institutional church) plays.

James Allen writes: A strong man cannot help a weaker unless that weaker is willing to be helped, and even then the weak man must become strong himself; he must, by his own efforts, develop the strength which he admires in another. None but himself can alter his condition.

It has been usual for men to think and to say, "Many men are slaves because one is an oppressor; let us hate the oppressor." Now, however, there is among an increasing few a tendency to reverse this judgment, and to say, "One man is an oppressor because many are slaves; let us despise the slaves."

The truth is that oppressor and slave are cooperators in ignorance, and, while seeming to afflict each other, are in reality afflicting themselves. A perfect Knowledge perceives the action of law in the weakness of the oppressed and the misapplied power of the oppressor; a perfect Love, seeing the suffering which both states entail, condemns neither, a perfect Compassion embraces both oppressor and oppressed. [As a man thinketh]

---

Secularists Also Note American Exceptionalism

Berdj Kenadjian writes:

Even scholars who have shown no interest in spiritual history could not help observing something special in the spirit of those who came to the new world. According to the celebrated historians Charles and Mary Beard, "That something was a quality of energy, enterprise, daring, or aspiration that was to be a power in the course of American history, immediately and by transmission through coming generations."
[Kenadjian, 48]

With the Constitution for a rudder and the Declaration of Independence as its guiding star, the ship of state is sailing always toward a brighter vision of freedom and justice for all. [Eldridge Cleaver. Soul on Ice. p 79]

Friends of Diversity

---

[In the aftermath of September 11,] when I saw America's whites and blacks crying in each other's arms -- and I mean in each other's arms -- when I saw Democrats and Republicans arm in arm singing "God Bless America", when I saw them drop all their differences, I was flabbergasted [and proud - and inspired]. Oriana Fallaci La Rabbia e l'Orgoglio [The Rage and the Pride]

Ua Mau ke Ea o ka Aina i ka Pono

(The life of the land is perpetuated in righteousness)

A faith for common folk:

Never Give Up. Never, never, never give up. A site about suffering and endurance. This site tells the native American saga of hope and triumph. It was an example of fortitude in the face of mutual antagonisms, a story of persistance in the face of, at times, veritable genocide. In the end, the world cannot help but respect the sacrifices and the qualities of faith (and authentic spirituality) shining through those dark times.

What is religion? - The American conundrum, a people more religious, one might almost say, than any other batch or sampling to be found, yet after a century and one half of colonial experience, a nation which became the first secular experiment in history; established the first official enactment of religious freedom; became the first secular republic in the world. The year was 1791. The event was the ratification of the bill of rights.

The clash of ideas is the sound of freedom - what shocked the Europeans so much in those early days was an idea the Founders may have gotten from the past : the daring idea that the ordinary citizen might sift between competing theories, then decide for himself his own destiny.

The occult beginnings of America - What was the pivotal role played by the Freemasonry of the founders, the crucial role played by the Illuminati, and the powerful characer of George Washington himself?

Columbus and the jumpstart of America - Cristóbal Colón. Columbus came in Jesus name. When the "Christ-bearer" landed on the shores of San Salvador, Holy Saviour, (October 12, 1492) little could he foresee the future of the new world he did not know was new. Our religious roots and the paradox of freedom of conscience, the separation of church and state. A Bible-thumping country, perhaps. But also a secular republic. Go figure.

Barack Obama: this historic candidate "I have brothers, sisters, nieces, nephews, uncles and cousins, of every race and every hue, scattered across three continents, and for as long as I live, I will never forget that in no other country on earth is my story even possible." The issue of hyper-patriotism and the controversy over American exceptionalism.

The American Moses : Martin Luther King, Jr. God sent Moses to tell old Pharaoh, "Let my people GO!" The southern white poet laureate, Robert Penn Warren asked: Have we, in America, had a hero in our time -- that is, since World War II? I can think of only one with a serious claim, Martin Luther King. The theme was high, the occasion noble, the stage open to the world's eye, the courage clear and against odds. And martyrdom came to purge all dross away.

Here's a site for more on the evangelical side -- the earthy, democratic Bible thumping religion, so popular with the lower classes, so prevalent among the social outcasts. Imbued with a deep religiosity perhaps of African earnestness, this evangelicalist style took hold on the frontier, sometimes raged among the black folk of the South, spread amongst the common folk and touched the elites as well.

Asylum for the outcasts of the old world - city on a hill? Or refuge for the offscourings, the dredges of humanity, tossed up by the waves. Eric Hoffer says that by embracing the world's 'undesirables' America enriched itself with the greatest treasures of all, the human hopes and dreams and ideals - simple people yearning to breathe free.

Chosen by Destiny - these anointed leaders sent by God? - how interesting that standing out head and shoulders above the crowd, America's exceptional leaders appearing from time to time have almost without exception been great idealists, men of moral stature, liberals (in the best sense of the word). We think of Lincoln, but also Jefferson and Jackson, the two Roosevelts, et al. Arthur Schlesinger, Jr declared: "Every great crisis has produced a leader adequate to the occasion from the ranks of those who believe vigorously and seriously in liberty, democracy and the common man."

Open Mine Eyes, Lord - Our brain cells need transforming? In Styles of Radical Will, Susan Sontag says: "There are ways of thinking that we don't know about. Nothing could be more important or precious than that knowledge, however unborn. The sense of urgency, the spiritual restlessness it engenders, cannot be appeased."

Primeval Nature Mysticism - older than America's great gospel traditon, Nature Mysticism may be our real "civil religion." Close to Native Americana, this "pantheistic" spiritualism has no creed, no dogma, no theology -- and has been called mankind's hoariest and humblest "religion."

Celebrate multiculturalism - our beautiful rainbow - I cannot affirm God if I fail to affirm man. Therefore, I affirm both. Without a belief in human unity I am hungry and incomplete. Human unity is the fulfillment of diversity. It is the harmony of opposites. It is a many-stranded texture, with color and depth. This sense of human unity makes possible a reverence for life. (Norman Cousins)

New world heritage from Middle East - America's "pop" religion owes much to its roots deep in the Shemitic east. Abraham, father of nations, was the son of the Middle East (and Africa). Performed here by Streisand and Mathis -- you-tube. Beautiful images of "the Holy City."

Our "LEFTIST" founding fathers [preesi lefora] America's experiment shocked and horrified Old Europe. To trust the average citizen was tantamount to radicalism, subversiveness, "DEMOCRACY" (what we would call socialism), and Jacobin mob-rule. America was rife with grassroots religious enthusiasm, yet had established a godless Constitution -- later hailed by Tocqueville as successful -- the first middle-class Democracy in history.

Columbus meets the Indians So tractable, so peaceable, are these people that I swear to your Majesties there is not in the world a better nation. They love their neighbors as themselves, and their discourse is ever sweet and gentle, and accompanied with a smile; and though it is true that they are naked, yet their manners are decorous and praiseworthy. The King [the leader or chief] observes such a wonderful estate in such a dignified manner that it is a pleasure to see. Neither better people nor land can there be. The houses and villages are so pretty. They love their neighbors as themselves and they have the sweetest speech in the world and they are gentle and they are always laughing. The Old Navigator, Christopher Columbus

friend me (facebook)

Pray for Our Nation's Leaders:

2 Chronicles 7:14

If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves,
and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then
will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land.
Presidential Prayer Team

Without commonly shared and widely entrenched moral values and obligations, neither the law,
nor democratic government, nor even the market economy will function properly. ~ Vaclav Havel
[The Velvet Revolution]

If Democrats need to get their SOUL back (and return to God), Republicans have an even bigger challenge, to soften their hearts toward the hurting, and discover that compassion and mercy are basic to who we must be. We are members one of another. If one suffers, all suffer. [Bob Shepherd - Feb 28, 2012 FACEBOOK]

---

"The United States has a manifest destiny to be an example and a blessing to the entire human race. The entire Constitution was intended to be such a model for the world of how a people can govern themselves and thereby enjoy an unlimited amount of freedom, prosperity, and peace. Our greatest export was to be freedom." from nccs.net

Annalee Skarin writes God desires a people who can pioneer in physical, scientific and spiritual fields. He desires mankind not only to understand the purpose of their existence, but to courageously cast out all fear -- to march with their faces to the light, unwaveringly and uncomplainingly. He desires that they learn to humble themselves in great and mighty prayer that they might be a great people. No man is greater than his power to humble himself. God desires a people who can exercise faith to accomplish the things beyond human power. "And he who receiveth all things with thankfulness shall be made glorious; and the things of this earth shall be added unto him, even an hundred-fold, yea more." [Doctrine and Covenants 78:19] from Annalee Skarin Volume I [1952] p17.

this tripod webpage created by robert shepherd
delicta quis intellegit ab occultis meis munda me

from secret flaws deliver me

I Corinthians 6:18

At Gound Zero, in the wake of 9/11. President Bush declared:
Make no mistake, the United States will hunt down and punish those responsible for these cowardly acts.

Ground Zero Post Script

|

Pray for Peace
911memorial.org

Love Your Enemies - bin Laden?

God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.
(The President read Psalm 46 in its entirety.) I love our country.
The God of Jacob is our refuge.

*God is our refuge and strength*

---

LEST WE FORGET

All Gave Some - - - Some Gave All

Silent Voices of the Past: unanswered questions about southeast Asia

he who has a thousand friends has not a friend to spare and he who has   one   enemy will meet him   everywhere.

The greatness of Napoleon, Caesar or Washington is only moonlight by the sun of Lincoln. His example is universal and will last thousands of years . . . . He is bigger than his country -- bigger than all the Presidents together . . . and as a great character he will live as long as the world lasts. [Leo Tolstoy] See Lincoln of Illinois

friend me (facebook)

facebook me

can we all just get along?

no veteran left behind

Robert Warren Shepherd

[Last save : 9/11/2011]