COLUMN: Face problems within our borders
The Sunday School teacher in church last week wrote an interesting statement/question on the board. It said: “Just to ponder, not debate: Are we safer today than we were on Sept. 11, 2001?”
Over the past couple of days, I started to really ponder that question. What has really happened in the past five years to make us safer?
This is a tricky question by itself. Our country’s actions over the past five years are certainly eyebrow-raising, and deserve some pondering of their own before I could figure out if it’s helping keep us safe.
I did have a thought though. Despite the war waging elsewhere, there has been a lot of violence happening in house within the last five years.
Less than a year after the attacks on the World Trade Center, Elizabeth Smart was kidnapped from her home in Salt Lake City. The summer of 2004 brought the Lori Hacking murder. Hacking and her unborn child were shot by her husband and dumped in a dumpster. Her remains were found at a landfill. More recently, there was the kidnapping and murder of Destiny Norton, who was found at a neighbor’s home dead. Then there are others – child abuse cases, a boy who killed his mother and stuffed her in a freezer.
Sadly, it goes on and on. The question is, why?
There’s probably more than one reason. You would think if a situation like this could be solved by fixing just one little thing, the world would do it. Then it would be done and people wouldn’t have to worry about their neighbors hurting their families or strangers attacking out of nowhere. We could move on to a utopia of sorts, where people were kind to each other just because it was the humane thing to do. They’d keep control over there tempers and act honestly in their dealings.
Sounds a lot like heaven, doesn’t it? Perhaps that’s our problem: we are slowing destroying our heaven on Earth. We are readily rearranging and rebuilding our country with the mission of excluding God.
I understand why this is an issue. America has to be fair. The First Amendment protects the people against religious persecution and against an established religion. Therefore, if you don’t want to believe in God, you don’t have to. If you want to worship and believe in the divine power of a soda can, go right ahead. That’s your right.
With this basic freedom planted deep in roots, the mentioning of God in anything related to the stars and stripes freaks people out – at least it started to a few years ago. But I think those of you who are adamant about removing the word God from our country are getting the wrong idea.
Certainly, God is important to America. He is protected under the First Amendment. But putting the word “God” in our pledge, on our courthouses or on our money doesn’t mean America is organizing a religion. The meaning of the word “God” changes all the time, mostly depending on whose mouth it’s coming from.
The question is: what is God to you? Let me illustrate with a little fill in the blank: “I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under ___ …”
This is the part where you fill in the blank. Is God a divine being? Is it a soda can? Maybe it’s nothing? The point is, it doesn’t matter. Believe what you will. America doesn’t care which you choose.
To America, God is an idea. It’s the idea that a people can come together and form a nation that can make the world a better place. Of course, we’re still arguing about how to do that exactly, which is why I think America is not any safer today than it was five years ago.
We are divided, in more ways than one. We’ve forgotten the little things that keep us together. Americans bond in times of tragedy, but in times of the regular chaos of living, we bicker and fight. We’ve all forgotten what we’re working for. We’ve forgotten the idea that we can unite and be great. We have forgotten God.
Last Monday morning, one of the front-page newspapers headlines read something like this: “We will never forget.” I’m sure the nation will never forget what happen on Sept. 11. It was a terrible event. But I think we have forgotten some of the lessons we learned that day and for us that could be the real tragedy.
Mikaylie Kartchner is a senior majoring in print journalism. Comments can be sent to mikayliek@cc.usu.edu.