Our Cultural Battlegrounds

by Scott Ashley, Managing editor

Imagine, for a moment, that America's founding fathers came to life again. What would they think to see the issues that are tearing apart the nation's social and cultural fabric? Consider a few news items from the last year:

• In San Francisco, a judge ruled that a new federal law banning partial-birth abortions—in which a baby is almost fully delivered before its skull is punctured and crushed—is unconstitutional because it interferes with a woman's "right to choose."

• In Los Angeles, the county board of supervisors, faced with a threatened lawsuit from the American Civil Liberties Union, (ACLU), voted to remove a cross from the county seal. The tiny cross was one of several historical symbols on the seal, which includes a much larger depiction of Pomona, the Roman goddess of fruit trees—to which the ACLU raised no objection.

• In Massachusetts, the state's highest court ordered that same-sex marriages be legalized. Officials in New York, California and Oregon quickly defied their own state laws and began performing marriages for thousands of homosexual couples.

• A California-based federal court, acting on a complaint from an atheist, ruled that the words "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance are unconstitutional. (The decision was overturned on a technicality by the U.S. Supreme Court, which sidestepped the issue itself.)

• A federal court ruled that the chief justice of the supreme court of Alabama must remove a display containing the Ten Commandments (and quotes from the founding fathers) from the Alabama State Judicial Building. The chief justice was threatened with termination and then actually fired when he refused.

• In a Texas case, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down a law banning homosexual acts, in effect legalizing homosexual activity throughout the United States and overturning dozens of state laws.

How would America's founding fathers view such developments?

What would they think on hearing that American courts have outlawed school prayer and Bible reading—especially when the first official act of the Continental Congress was to open its first meeting with prayer?

What would they think to learn that American judges have found that the Constitution they framed prohibits public display of the Ten Commandments but contains the right to homosexual acts and same-sex marriage?
What would they think on hearing that a federal court ruled the words "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance unconstitutional but that courts have repeatedly ruled that the Constitution contains a woman's right to kill her unborn child?

What would they think on discovering that more than 40 million tiny infant boys and girls—more than the entire population of many other countries—have been literally dismembered in the name of "freedom of choice"?

In this edition we focus on the unspoken issue at the heart of all these debates—the battle over the Bible. Is it the holy, truthful and authoritative Word of God, or is it only human tradition and stories? It's crucial that you examine the evidence. GN