Trinity IV
July 4th Sunday
Annuit Coeptis

A Latin phrase pregnant with meaning can be found etched on the American dollar bill.  The words Annuit Coeptis are written just over the pyramid with an eye on the top.  The phrase means, “He has smiled on our undertakings.”  Positioned where it is, there is no question about its meaning.  The eye at the top of the pyramid is a symbol of an all-seeing God.  Thus the reference, “He has smiled on our undertakings,” unmistakably connects the prosperity of this great land to the blessing of God Almighty.  Maybe the important facts behind a nation that would put “He smiled on our undertakings” on its currency will help us to understand what American was meant to be.

Fact one concerns our first great leader, George Washington.  George Washington was sworn into the office of President of the United States with his hand on an open Bible turned to a significant verse from 2 Chronicles 7:14 in the Old Testament: “If My people who are called by My name will humble themselves and pray and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land.”  Washington, the nation’s first leading political servant, believed God was the source of the nation’s strength.  And in case there is any doubt about his thoughts on the relationship between God and the nation, he spoke the following words in his Farewell address: “Religion and morality are the indispensable supports of political prosperity. . . . Who . . .can look with indifference upon attempts to shake the foundation of the fabric?”  For Washington, the foundation of the fabric was God Almighty, and specifically the Triune Christian God.

Fact two concerns not only the leader, but the founding leaders of our nation.  The vast majority of them were explicitly Christian.  And even the deists and fringe Christian element was so wrapped in a Christian context that even so called “non Christians” helped to establish this Christian Republic.  They understood that only the Christianity that they didn’t believe could protect the liberty of what they did embrace. 

Nevertheless, the leadership who crafted the leading documents of our nation were not only Christians, but Episcopalians.  Two thirds of the signers of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution were Episcopalians.  Their convictions were formed by a theistic view of the state even though they were rejecting the English monarchy.  They prayed essentially the same prayer, using the 1662 BCP as is found in our Prayer for the Whole State of Christ’s Church.  The language is only slightly modified because of change from a monarchy to a Republic, in which the following paragraph for civil rulers can be found: “We beseech thee also, so to direct and dispose the hearts of all Christian Rulers, that they may truly and impartially administer justice, to the punishment of wickedness and vice, and to the maintenance of thy true religion, and virtue.”  A non-Christian ruler in the eighteenth-century western world, pre-French Revolution, was inconceivable.  The presumption was that these Christian magistrates would uphold true religion, meaning Christianity.

Standing in his pew in St. John’s Episcopal Church,
Richmond, VA, Patrick Henry spoke in “torrents of sublime eloquence,” averring, “Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and liberty?  Forbid it, Almighty God!  I know not what course others will take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death.”  For Henry and the vast majority of the founding fathers of our nation, Christianity was the only religion that promoted true religious freedom.  They fervently worked for a Christian society that would allow religious freedoms, which brings me to the final and perhaps most difficult fact to comprehend.

Fact number three concerns the Founding Fathers’ sense of America as a Christian Republic.  There is no doubt that this conviction lay behind the documents such as the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution.  They wanted a Christian society without an Emperor like Constantine or Charlemagne and without a Pope at the center.  The only way to have a Christian culture without a prince or pope governing was a Christian Roman Republic.  And for the Founding Fathers this view was based on John Locke’s Trinitarian notion of Republic.  The Holy Trinity with belief in God as a single Being in three Persons answered the greatest philosophical and political riddle.  Philosophically it explained how the tension between the one and the many was resolved.  Politically, it illumined how at the same time a society could be ruled by one and the many; it is called representative government.  Furthermore, only the Trinitarian view of God provided for any real concept of person and personal freedom, which was the ultimate antidote to tyranny.  We should remember that there was not concept of person until St. Augustine.  The Greeks spoke of individuation and individuality, but they had no concept of person as it was developed around the Christian doctrine of One God, Three Persons.  Without Christianity there is really no concept of person; people are not really persons but possessions . . . things to be acquired or discarded at the will of the tyrant or sheik.  Perhaps Patrick Henry reflected this advanced way of thinking theologically about political theory when he wrote, “Bad men cannot make good citizens.  It is impossible that a nation of infidels or idolaters should be a nation of free men.  It is when a people forget God that tyrants forge their chains.  A vitiated state of morals, a corrupted public conscience are incompatible with freedom.”  In the words of Arnold Toynbee about the effect of Christianity on the Roman Empire, “The first heralds of the Gospel brought a living faith to a dying civilization.”

Therefore, as we celebrate our nation’s birthday, religious language on our coinage and in our pledge is appropriate.  After all, Francis Bellamy, a Baptist clergyman wrote the pledge of allegiance and another minister wrote “My Country Tis of Thee.”  Let us not be reluctant to tell the world that only the Trinitarian Christian God protects true liberty. The words of America that we sing express best the great freedom, the smile of God, resulting on a land that embraces Christianity: “Long may our land be bright/with freedom’s holy light/protect us by Thy might/Great God our King!” Amen.