I began this series talking about a different view of the peak of Western civilization, one from the much more distant past, when men were men and everyone knew their place in the order of things.

Two competing views: cooperation vs. order; peace through negotiation vs. peace through strength; democracy vs. autocracy; liberalism vs. authoritarianism.

I wonder if the nostalgia that people have for the 1950s and 60s is for liberalism. They picture it as a time when church attendance peaked (at 49%) as families went to their local mainline churches to learn the Golden Rule.

There was no authority on earth that could force the South to end its practice of slavery or become a true democracy, because the Bible did not compel them to do so.

Appeals to biblical authority are often used to abuse power and escape accountability.

Yet, again and again, the sword called to them.

The dual state does not exist accidentally. It is constructed through fear, codified, and protected by “tradition.”

The civil rights movement sought to dismantle the dual state.

Those who advocate for equality are often demonized as leftists, socialists or even communists. Demanding equal application of the Bill of Rights is neither; it is the liberalism on which the United States was founded.

It is also the way of Jesus.

I understand that this might sound a little too mystical, but I wanted to go through this exercise to remind us that Christianity is more than a ticket into heaven when we die.

I also want us to see how when Christians mature into stages 4 and 5, when they see those cracks, they become awakened to the suffering in this world and they try to do something about it.

The Constitution is the authority, not the Bible, nor the Church, nor any creed.

As concerned as they were about the abuse of power by a despot, these men did not extend the freedom and authority they took for themselves to all the people around them, but over the next two centuries, the distribution of power increased.

Not everyone likes that. Christian Nationalism seeks to return power to the few.

I have felt the pain of what happens when a handful of “well meaning” people forget professional ethics. When a necessary lie is followed by another and another; when self-protection becomes the mission; and when those who ask for transparency and accountability become the problem.