Found on the inside cover of a Bible that was given to a soldier during the Great War (WWI) with a special message from the president, Woodrow Wilson:
“The
Bible is the word of life. I beg that you will read it and find this
out for yourselves,–read, not little snatches here and there, but long
passages that will really be the road to the heart of it. You will find
it full of real men and women, not only but also of the things you have
wondered about and been troubled about all your life, as men have been
always; and the more you read the more it will become plain to you what
things are worth while and what are not, what makes men
happy,–loyalty, right dealing, speaking the truth, readiness to give
everything for what they think their duty, and, most of all, the wish
that they may have the approval of the Christ, who gave everything for
them,–and the things that are guaranteed to make men
unhappy,–selfishness, cowardice, greed, and everything that is low and
mean.
“When you have read the
Bible you will know that it is the Word of God, because you will have
found it the key to your own heart, your own happiness, and your own
duty.”
Woodrow Wilson
No
one thought this encouragement the equivalent of state establishment of
religion then. Has the definition of state establishment changed? If
not, then what has? Good discussion question for rhetoric stage
students.
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