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Tag Archives: America

America’s Indefatigable Exceptionalism!

30 Friday Jun 2017

Posted by Cheryl Ries in Beauty, Blessings, Celebration, Commitment, Freedom, God, Gratitude

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America, Constitutional Republic, Exceptionalism, Freedom, Independence Day

I have to admit, I’m a bit confused as to when it became popular to find America and our societal values so disagreeable? When did bashing our prior history to the point of attempting to erase it become so en vogue? In which year did the subtle erosion of American ideals and the disbelief in our national exceptionalism begin? Are they teaching this in our schools now? I grew up having America’s exceptionalism reaffirmed in common places and regular intervals, we closed our days by reaffirming on our television sets that our nation’s banner flew proudly over a united, grateful nation and that God’s blessings upon us were assured! Patriotism was not seen as a nagging character defect but rather an inherent part of a typical American’s DNA! Most of us seemed proud enough to place our hands on our hearts whenever we saw Ol’ Glory wave in all her majesty or whenever we had the chance to proclaim it through our national anthem! I just don’t comprehend this brewing anti-American sentiment which is inching forward through each generation in popularity, popping up often in groups yearning to proclaim their eager victim status, inflamed by unsettling rhetoric. None of this makes sense to me, even with a federal government which doesn’t always align exactly with my political beliefs, I’ve always seen American bi-partisan interests at work through a people united for the sake of America’s continued success. But recently, all of that is changing. A large swath of our culture seems to want to change America of late, it just wasn’t working for them. So that is what they set out to do more avidly within the last decade or maybe even well before that. Now those social justice warriors and their dissatisfied predecessors (who probably began this pursuit well before this generation) have succeeded in changing my beloved nation into something I almost no longer recognize as readily as the America of my youth! Our nation now seems intrinsically more broken as we approach this year’s Independence Day celebration. I’m concerned in ways I’ve never been before about our stability and our unity, as I never thought we’d actually have so many American citizens who seem to loathe their own nation! They look to things in our nation’s past as sins, unforgivable and insurmountable. They see our intricate system of governance as dated and passe`.  

I am of the other school of thought, that which believes, and always will, in America’s indefatigable exceptionalism! I grew up in a time when that was still presumed the case by a majority, as it was known in my home, practiced at all my schools throughout all my grades, and echoed routinely in most public entities by way of our culture’s common norms and values. This concept of American exceptionalism was seemingly settled for most of my life, its existence and origins were known to most everyone I came into contact with.  After all,  it derived not from some benevolent human pronouncement, but rather from a nation sure of its inception based on individual freedom which only God can bestow! Our founding fathers knew that human beings were only free when no tyrant or ruling party could dictate their every willful matter, especially their choice of religious practice or by impeding people’s ability to speak their minds. In modern terms, that would mean the founders knew inherently that a limited and smaller federal government was the only possible way to govern a nation truly desirous of maintaining such an imperative concept as that of individual liberty. Our American exceptionalism is derived from putting the individual and individual freedom ahead of a vast, dictatorial state body of some type capable through their size and/or power of overruling such God-given individual rights. The individual is the basis of our form of governance, that’s the most important entity in a Constitutional Republic like ours. In our brilliant founding, the government exists to serve “we, the people”, and not the opposite! The individual liberty we all inherently have through our Creator is the impetus for protective representation at the state and federal level, as well as for the integral balance of power of the three separate but equal branches of government at the federal level to protect the overall united Republic and its governing processes, quintessential to the founders’ design when drafting the documents which assured our nation’s first foundations of unity and governance! After all, most of our founding fathers and those who fueled our fledgling independence from England had witnessed state-dictated religion and actual serfdom to some oppressive ruling body such as a monarchy. They wanted no part of being ruled again!  

Now, this form of governance does not come without personal responsibility on the part of its citizenry. Our nation began with brilliant minds confirming our inherent right to live freely, to determine our own individual destiny! We must continue to participate in educating those who come after us as to what we are and how we are comprised, compelling each generation’s interest as to the vital importance of preserving and protecting our Constitutional Republic! It’s not a trite outmoded concept based on stale, outdated documents! Our Constitution and Bill of Rights are the backbone of this living unified being we call the United States of America. Without our Constitution and the Amendments which affirm our inherent freedoms, the brilliance of our founding eventually morphs into a chaotic governing body disavowing of individual liberty, which leads to a vast, impersonal state able to usurp our precious, invaluable, protected freedoms! God help us if any more of our citizenry become so enamored of this seemingly suicidal belief that America is not an exceptional nation, such that more of us throw our liberty to the winds of time and fate by welcoming an even larger, more contemptuous federal bureaucracy than what we already have to rule over us! Or that we would further hang our heads in shame for whatever we’ve done throughout our history, as though we haven’t actually earned any praise battling against the enemies of freedom all over this planet, bleeding profusely via both our flesh and treasure, sacrificing routinely, greatly, and often for liberty’s sake! We’re an imperfect people running as perfect a system of government as imperfect humans can devise and manage, with a most brilliant Constitution as our base! We must do our best to perpetuate as a Constitutional Republic. And we must never let liberty’s torch fade in the cold draft of our indifference, corrupt influences, or an intolerance for our very own well-being! America is something special, it always has been and it always will be if we insist upon educating those who follow as to why it is we dare make that claim!  

This Independence Day, let us Americans try to remember why our founders dared to draft such brilliant founding documents to protect and secure our individual liberty, why so many of us have fought, bled and often died throughout our history to protect these shores and our interests abroad, and why we have always affirmed our principled values united as willing patriots, regaling our beloved banner, eager to preserve this great nation with our spirit of gratitude and perseverance! As President Ronald Reagan once so eloquently and prophetically stated, “If we lose freedom here, there is no place to escape to. This is the last stand on Earth.” God bless America, and may God keep America in the palm of His hand, safe, prosperous, united and ever-grateful for such abundant blessings and such obvious exceptionalism!

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An Intervention!

22 Friday Jul 2016

Posted by Cheryl Ries in Blessings, Choices, Freedom, God, Maturity, Self-Control, Strength, Success

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America, Freedom, Great, Intervention

Sometimes as kids, we got caught up in the wrong things or got headed in directions which our parents knew were not good for us. We didn’t know the peril we faced, or we just risked it anyway to have our fun or gain our rewards. But our parents realized or feared that we would suffer in the end if we continued on that course. Perhaps we had already gone a significant amount of time in that misdirection before they intervened or before they were aware of how dangerous our future would be if we continued. But like all parents who accept their responsibility as guardians and caretakers, they stepped in when they spotted trouble ahead for their children. It is their duty as parents to watch over and protect those who they believe are vulnerable, in need of more maturity, unable to yet make the right choices, or are not yet fully aware of many of life’s realities. Surely we don’t always agree that we need their intervention in our lives, after all, don’t we all like to think we know best for ourselves what is best for us? But even as we mature into adulthood, our parents or others who are more aware of what is happening, often come to our rescue by way of an intervention if and when we falter in our choices. It is the role of family, community, and the inherent support structure of human beings. We are all closely intertwined and connected because sometimes our actions affect others whether we think it, know it or believe it!

thomas-jefferson-quote-969x600

When many of us unite in dangerous behavior because we make bad choices collectively, whether purposefully or through our own ignorance of the inherent dangers to ourselves or others, we put others at risk too. So often, what we’ve done, even for a significant time, might now require a sudden or emergency intervention. And so it is in our nation right now. For too long, those who either don’t know the best direction for America or are making flawed choices on purpose, have been enacting policies which are taking us all down a harmful course. Through their elected roles as the fiduciary for the people, they have spent us into significant risk and a dangerous debt in the trillions of dollars, among other missteps. And so, someone has to step in and intervene. Someone or some “body” has to be more disciplined about the choices America has been making through our elected officials. We are dangerously close to a tipping point of no return! Unfortunately, many haven’t yet caught on, but fortunately, many have! Our federal government is broken as a system right now. It has become far too corrupt and those serving the people – often for decades at a time – have become a part of the corruption, feeding and self-prospering off the people rather than making decisions which serve to prosper all the nation. So the part of this interwoven, reliant community we call America, which is on heightened alert to the dangers ahead on this continued course, now are responding to the group of citizens which aren’t yet awake to the perils, are willing participants, or are complacent about the possible dangers we might all collectively face if we don’t right ourselves from this course we are now on. It’s a corrective response we now must make and take for the sake of our beloved America, much like a parent intervening on their child’s behalf, rather than continuing with the status quo! We cannot continue imperiled by such corruption and such abuse of power at so many levels of government, even if all of us have yet to understand that as our condition. 

Patriotic-Quotes,-Best,-Meaningful,-Sayings,-True-Patriot-

With such freedom as this country espouses, there is great personal responsibility required to maintain it! We must all do our part to see that we enjoy prosperity, but that we also understand that along with it, there is a need for self-discipline, self-control, and a self-impetus to create our share of the prosperity. Now not everyone will believe that others know better at this juncture. But this righting of America’s course is an imperative many are willing to endure for the betterment of all and for our future generations, just like the 3% of the colonial America population who stood up to face the oppressive British imperialism which sought to prevent our becoming a free nation. We should all willingly stand vigil over our freed nation to ensure that it remains exactly that! I believe we’re about to have an intervention for our own good in November 2016! And I pray that God will continue to bless this nation by enabling the willing among us to make America one great nation again, and to make America America again!  

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Cheryl Ries-Author & Model

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