I know that I told you I didn't like the governments view on Church and State issues, but we have a lot of freedom in America. Is there any other country that would allow us to do as much as we can here?
I said before I'm a little plain speaking. Am I missing your points about the "Big Brother" "Caesar" thing?
To answer the second question first, I'm not sure. I've written on the Caesar thing so often that I
hope I was being clear - but it's possible I am assuming you've read other things that perhaps you haven't...
So, I will speak plainly.
As to the government's view on Church and State, that's a good place to start.
This nation was once a Constitutional Republic (and NEVER a "democracy", although I suspect not one congresscritter in a hundred knows that, or could explain the difference).
The essence of government under God was once summed up in the second paragraph of the Declaration of Independence..."
that all men...are endowed by their Creator...with Rights..." and that the singular reason why governments are instituted is "
to secure these Rights". That such "
just powers" are "
derived from the consent of the governed".
"No king but King Jesus" was a rallying cry from those days, but unfortunately no more. Not only presidents but treasury secretaries and central bankers, and those who own them, all seem to be above the law.
Regulators, don't. (They were never constitutional to begin with, of course, so that outcome at least was inevitable.) Our fake "money" bears no more resemblance to what God described as "honest" weights and measures than this 'democracy' does to the old Republic.
Finally, Michelle, I'd have to make a correction to the central point of your first question. It's not so much about how "much freedom" we have, but how much we have
left. Even if it is still true that everywhere else in the world, or through most of history, is still
worse, that claim obscures the fact that we have watched as "essential liberty has been traded for a little temporary security" for long enough to know how much has been lost. (I used to joke on my radio show that we would have to keep a copy of a "search warrant" around just so future school indoctrinees could see how quaint they were. I've stood in "free speech zones" and asked cops if they knew what the oath they once swore meant. I know personally which Bible verses will now get one arrested. And I don't even joke about the "even numbered amendments" in the obsolete "Bill of Rights" any more.)
I do have a problem with the concept of what we are "allowed" to do. Somehow I don't think a man like Patrick Henry would have accepted that premise*. Back when we had a government of Law, and not of men, power was delegated TO the state from those who created it. It was GOVERNMENT that was allowed to do certain things - and ONLY those enumerated, specific, certain things. Sadly, that has changed - has it not?
And as for the rest of the world, I do have one observation. Very few other nations, from Brazil to Botswana, have the police state infrastructure to support the coming "Mark" yet, as this nation does. Pedestrians in Honduras aren't acclimated to being video-monitored at every intersection, grocery store, and butcher stand, or going through metal detectors in order to meet their civil "servants", judges, and schoolteachers.
Samuel warned the people what a king would do - if they persisted in demanding a king like "all the other nations". (I Sam. 8, esp. v. 7) We once knew better, too.
Blessings,
Mark
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* And I don't think many people under the age of 40 would even know who he was.
