Philip Bakker
Image: Maureen Hutton
No matter how America will continue, one thing is certain.
The power of the principles on which America rests will remain forever. The power of the United States of America remains, as how the USA began. Perhaps for many people the outside view of America got stained. Yet, those stains are NOT America.
America had a new birth of freedom once. And it can do it again. It needs trust. And we have to look for truth together. Truth without love isn’t truth. Love without truth isn’t love.
The principles on which America is founded
“The power of the United States, or any other democracy, arises from the principles upon which it is founded. Thus we can find the basis of power by examining such documents as the Constitution of the United States, the Bill of Rights, the Declaration of Independence and such acknowledged expressions of the spirit of democracy as the Gettysburg Address. […]
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.”
These sentiments are echoed in the Gettysburg Address where Lincoln reminds us that this nation was conceived in Liberty and “… dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal” and that “this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom – and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”
(Source: David R. Hawkins: Power vs. Force. 2002. p.63.)
I love America, and I’m worried about the current situation. What to do?
I hope the Americans can find the strength to go for trust in America and in her principles.
And perhaps in the way Jordan Peterson put it five years ago:
“… as if we’re riding on the back of a giant snake and it’s twisting and turning all the time, and we’re trying to figure out how to stay in the center. So that we don’t fall off the sides you know. Sometimes it’s time for a bit of a tilt to the left and sometimes it’s a bit time for a bit of a tilt to the right and the only way you can tell when that time is, is by having a discussion about it. So it’s the discussion that keeps us centered. It’s not the fact that the conservatives are right or that the liberals are right. They’re both necessary, annoying as that is.” (https://youtu.be/vdHJjbHwR38)
AMERICA Cannot Be Conquered
By Maureen Heaton: The Impossible Dream, 1990 (back cover)
“AMERICA” is not a country. It is not a Flag. It is not a parchment Statement of Principles. It is not a Constitution. It is not Republicans nor Democrats, nor Parties, nor politicians. It is not mountains, nor plains, nor alabaster cities, nor rural crossroads.
AMERICA is a dream. It is the spark in the heart of man which burns the brightest when the cold draughts of tyranny fan the flame.
AMERICA is the embodiment of Everyman’s yearning to be free.
AMERICA is the child-heart struggling to grow – to be the man or woman promised at conception.
AMERICA is the culmination of the centuries-long confrontation by Man with the mortal limitations of his earthy being. It is the upward reach of humanity.
AMERICA is the intangible reflection of the human potential; of virtue unashamed; of truth, unspoiled.
AMERICA is the possibility of wealth – not just the riches of silver and gold, but of mental, spiritual and emotional wealth; of songs too beautiful for words, of poetry which gives reason to language; of the wealth unplumbed in the questioning mind, and the unbounded achievement of an individuals impossible dreams.
AMERICA is courage – limitless, unfettered courage. It is that special attribute which allows Man to conquer his own frailties, and rise above his physical constraints.
AMERICA is all that is best in Everyman – his hopes, his dreams, his love, his tenderness, his abilities, his warmth, his strengths, his honor.
Little men may pervert a Party, corrupt a politician, burn a Flag, tear up a parchment, ravage a treasured heritage, lay barren a countryside, destroy a country – but no earthly power can conquer the heart and soul of Man, nor ever rout the Dream.