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IS THIS AN UNTAMPERED FILE?
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This ASCII-file version of Imprimis, On Line was
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packaged by Applied Foresight, Inc. (AFI hereafter).
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Imprimis, On Line -- April, 1993
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Imprimis, meaning "in the first place," is a free
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monthly publication of Hillsdale College (circulation
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435,000 worldwide). Hillsdale College is a liberal arts
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institution known for its defense of free market
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principles and Western culture and its nearly 150-year
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refusal to accept federal funds. Imprimis publishes
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lectures by such well-known figures as Ronald Reagan,
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Jeane Kirkpatrick, Tom Wolfe, Charlton Heston, and many
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more. Permission to reprint is hereby granted, provided
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credit is given to Hillsdale College. Copyright 1992.
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For more information on free print subscriptions or
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back issues, call 1-800-437-2268, or 1-517-439-1524,
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ext. 2319.
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---------------------------------------------
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"Can We Be Good Without God?"
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by Chuck Colson
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Founder, Prison Fellowship
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Recipient, 1993 Templeton Prize
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---------------------------------------------
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Volume 22, Number 4
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Hillsdale College, Hillsdale, Michigan 49242
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April 1993
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---------------------------------------------
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Preview: There have been many explanations offered for
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social problems like crime and drug abuse in American
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society. But, as Chuck Colson argues, most of these
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explanations, even when they touch upon the breakdown
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of values, avoid addressing the fundamental question,
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"Can we be good without God?" His remarks were
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delivered at the 73rd Shavano Institute for National
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Leadership seminar, "Culture Wars," in Palm Beach,
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Florida, for over 400 business and community leaders
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from around the country.
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---------------------------------------------
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Last December, newspapers ran a striking photograph of
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a group of people held at bay by armed guards. They
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were not rioters or protesters; they were Christmas
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carolers. The town of Vienna, Virginia, had outlawed
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the singing of religious songs on public property. So
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these men, women, and children were forced to sing
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"Silent Night" behind barricades, just as if this were
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Eastern Europe under communist rule instead of
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Christmas in America in 1992.
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We have spent the past 30 years determined to
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secularize our society. Somemonths before the incident
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in Virginia, the U.S.Supreme Court ruled in Lee vs.
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Weisman that a rabbi who delivered a very politically
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correct "To Whom It May Concern" prayer at a Rhode
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Island junior high school commencement had violated the
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constitutional rights of a fifteen-year-old student in
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the audience. The Court said, in effect, that the girl
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must be legally protected against listening to views
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she disagreed with. There was a time when it was a mark
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of civility to listen respectfully to different views;
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now you have a constitutional right to demand that
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those views are not expressed in your presence.
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In another case that went all the way to the
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Supreme Court, visual religious symbols have been
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banned. Zion, Illinois, in the "heartland of America,"
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was forced to eliminate the cross featured in its city
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seal, because the Justices ruled it a breach of the
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First Amendment.
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In education, the same kind of court-enforced
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secularism has been so successful that teachers may
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hand out condoms in school, but they are forbidden to
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display a copy of the Ten Commandments on a bulletin
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board. Students, meanwhile, may indulge in almost any
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kind of activity in school, but they are forbidden to
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pray.
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The Supreme Court is not the only institution out
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to protect us from the "threat" faith poses. The media
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assault upon religious believers has been fierce.
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Cardinal O' Connor has been excoriated by the New York
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Times for even suggesting that he might deny the
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sacraments to a pro-choice legislator. (This was the
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same New York Times that praised a Louisiana archbishop
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who refused to administer communion to a segregationist
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legislator in 1962.)
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In February of 1993, the Washington Post featured
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a front-page article that characterized evangelical
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Christians as "largely poor, uneducated, and easy to
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command." If a journalist said that about any other
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group in America, he would be fired on the spot, but
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the Post didn't fire anyone. It merely expressed
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surprise that many readers found the description
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offensive. A few days later, one of the bemused editors
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explained that they felt they were simply printing
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something that is "universally accepted."
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It is no wonder that Peter Berger, professor of
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sociology at Boston University, says that if you look
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around the world you will find that the most religious
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country is India, and the most irreligious country is
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Sweden--and America is an interesting combination of
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Indians who are governed by Swedes.
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A Post-Christian Society
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These Swedes have done their job well. In 1962, polls
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indicated that at least 65 percent of all Americans
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believed the Bible to be true. In 1992, polls indicate
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that only 32 percent do, while 50 percent say that they
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actually fear fundamentalists. If the polls are right,
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our Judeo-Christian heritage is no longer the
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foundation of our values. We have become a post-
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Christian society.
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The process of "shedding" our religion began with
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the cultural revolution of the 1960s, which exalted
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existentialism and a kind of "live-for-the-moment-God-
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is-dead-or-irrelevant" philosophy. Today, that Sixties
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philosophy has become mainstream; it is in the White
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House, it is in the poetry of Maya Angelou, it is in
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every walk of life. This is not to say that people
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aren't going to church. Forty-four percent of the
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American people still attend religious services
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regularly. But we live in a Donahue-ized culture in
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which we sit and watch, hour by hour, the banality that
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passes for knowledge on television, and we rarely think
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about issues in terms of Judeo-Christian truth. We hear
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carolers singing "Silent Night" or an invocation at a
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public ceremony and we are filled with trepidation; we
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are worried that we are infringing upon the rights of
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nonbelievers. We see the symbol of the cross and we
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feel compelled to paint it out because it might violate
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the principle of separation between church and state.
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We exalt tolerance, not truth, as the ultimate virtue.
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The City of Man
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Can we really sustain the city of man without the
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influence of the City of God? St. Augustine argued that
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it was impossible.
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Any society, especially a free society, depends on
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a moral consensus and on shared assumptions: What is
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ultimate reali ty? What is meaningful in life? By what
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standards should we be governed? These common values
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are the glue that holds society together.
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In America, the glue is wearing pretty thin. We
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are in the middle of an identity crisis in which we are
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attempting to redefine our basic values all over again.
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We can no longer assume that right and wrong have clear
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meanings or that there is universal truth. After all,
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pollsters tell us that sixty-seven percent of the
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American people say there is no such thing.
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What we fail to realize, however, is that
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rejecting transcendental truth is tantamount to
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committing national suicide. A secular state cannot
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cultivate virtue--an old-fashioned word you don't hear
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much in public discourse these days. In his classic
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novel, The Brothers Karamazov, the 19th century Russian
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novelist Dostoyevsky asked, essentially, "Can man be
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good without God?" In every age, the answer has been
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no. Without a restraining influence on their nature,
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men will destroy themselves. That restraining influence
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might take many abstract forms, as it did for the
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Greeks and Romans, or it might be the God of the Old
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and the New Testaments. But it has always served the
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same purpose.
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Even before Dostoyevsky posed his timeless
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question, an 18th century German professor of logic and
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metaphysics, Immanuel Kant, had already dismissed it as
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irrelevant. God exists, said Kant, but he is separate
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from the rest of life. Over here are the things that we
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can empirically know; over there are things we can
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accept only on faith. What does that do to ethics?
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Kant's answer was to separate them from faith; we can,
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on our own, with only our rational capacities to depend
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upon, develop what he called the "categorical
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imperative." He explained: "Act as if the maxim from
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which you act were to become through your will a
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universal law."
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This rational, subjective view is the basis of
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ethics being taught in nearly every school in America
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today, from Public Grammar School No. 1 to Harvard
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Business School. Students are never exposed to
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traditional moral teaching in school, only to
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rationalism. Pragmaticism and utilitarianism are
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substituted for Judeo-Christian ethics, and students
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are taught that they have the inner capacity to do good
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rationally, apart from God.
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The Danger of Self-Righteousness
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Nothing could be more dangerous. Let me give you a case
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study: Chuck Colson. I grew up in the Depression years.
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My dad, who was the son of a Swedish immigrant, used to
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tell me two things on Sunday afternoon. Although no one
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in my family had ever gone to college, he said, "If you
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work hard, you can get to the top. That's the American
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dream." And the second thing he used to say was,
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"Always tell the truth. No matter what you do in life,
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always tell the truth."*
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I kept both of these pieces of advice in mind as I
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grew up, earned a scholarship to college and then went
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on to law school. I also remembered them when I joined
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a very successful law firm and years later in 1969 when
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President Nixon asked me to come to work at the White
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House. I took everything I had earned and put it into a
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blind trust. (If you want to make a small fortune, let
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me tell you how: You take a large fortune and put it in
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a blind trust.) I did everything to avoid even the
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appearance of a conflict of interest. I passed
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unsolicited gifts on to my employees. I refused to see
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people whom I had practiced law with or made business
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deals with--I mean, I really had studied Kant's
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categorical imperative, and I knew that I would always
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do right.
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What happened? I went to prison.
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Why? Because we are never more dangerous than when
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we are feeling self-righteous. We have an infinite
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capacity for this feeling and for the self-
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justification that accompanies it. It was only when
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Jesus Christ came into my life that I was able to see
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myself for who I am. Indeed, it is only when we all
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turn to God that we begin to see ourselves as we really
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are--as fallen sinners desperately in need of His
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restraint and His grace.
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Kant's philosophy, like much Enlightenment
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thought, was based on a flawed view of human nature
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that held that men are basically good and, if left to
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their own devices, will almost always do good things.
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It was also dead wrong in assuming that the categorical
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imperative could take the place of moral law. Just
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because men can think the right thing, it does not mean
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that they will heed it. Remember Pierre, one of the
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central characters in Tolstoy's War and Peace? Torn by
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spiritual agonies, he cried out to God, "Why is it that
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I know what is right and I do what is wrong?" We can
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know what is right, but we don't always have the will
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to do what is right.
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How Shall We Live?
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In books like Mere Christianity and The Abolition of
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Man, the 20th century British Christian apologist C.S.
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Lewis attempted to refute Kant and make a powerful
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intellectual case for the City of God that did not wall
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it off from the city of man. In an essay entitled, "Men
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Without Chests," he drew an analogy between the
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spiritual life and the body that sums up his objections
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to the supreme rationalism of the Enlightenment. The
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head, Lewis said, is reason, and the stomach is passion
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or appetite. The head alone cannot control the stomach.
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It needs the chest, which is spirit, to restrain our
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baser passions and appetites.
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Yet after World War II schools began to teach
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ethics based on subjective standards without
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transcendent moral truths. Lewis challenged this,
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writing, "We make men without chests and we expect of
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them virtue and enterprise. We laugh at honor and we
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are shocked to find traitors in our midst. We castrate
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and bid the geldings be fruitful." That is what we are
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doing in America today. We are taking away the
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spiritual element and abandoning morality based on
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religious truth, counting instead on our heads and our
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subjective feelings to make us do what is right.
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In our zeal to accommodate our so-called
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enlightened and tolerant age, we have lost the ideal of
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public virtue. I am reminded of Samuel Johnson, who,
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upon learning that one of his dinner guests believed
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morality was merely a sham, said to his butler, "Well,
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if he really believes that there is no distinction
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between virtue and vice, let us count the spoons before
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he leaves." Today, there aren't any spoons left to
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count. Look at Washington, Wall Street, academia,
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sports, the ministry--all the spoons are gone because
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we can no longer distinguish between virtue and vice.
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Recovering that ability depends on asking the
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right questions. Our brightest and best leaders are
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concerned with the question, "How shall we be
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governed?" But in the Book of Ezekiel the Jews asked:
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"How shall we live?" It doesn't matter who governs if
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society has no spiritual element to guide it. Unless we
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learn how to live--as men with chests--we are doomed.
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The City of God
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I have seen this truth most powerfully in the area in
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which I've been called to spend my life. With the help
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of my friend Jack Eckerd and others, I work with men
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and women in prison in 54 countries around the world.
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The crisis is grave. In Washington, D.C., for example,
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46 percent of the inner city black population between
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the ages of 18 and 31 is either in prison, on parole,
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or on probation. America as a whole has the highest per
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capita rate of incarceration in the world, and, for the
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last 25 years, the crime rate has gone up every year.
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We can't build prisons fast enough. In the last seven
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years, we have seen a 120 percent increase in murders
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committed by those between the ages of 18 and 20.
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According to some sources, twenty percent of all
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schoolchildren carry a weapon.
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Criminologist James Q. Wilson, among others, has
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tried to identify the root cause of this epidemic of
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violence. When he began his inquiry, he was certain
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that he would discover that in the great period of
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industrial revolution in the latter half of the 19th
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century there was a tremendous increase in crime. But,
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to his astonishment, he discovered a decrease. And then
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he looked at the years of the Great Depression. Again,
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there was a significant decrease in crime. Frustrated
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by these findings which upset all our preconceived
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notions, Wilson decided to search for a single factor
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to correlate. The factor he found was religious faith.
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When crime should have been rising in the late
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1800s because of rapid urbanization, industrialization,
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and economic dislocation, Victorian morality was
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sweeping across America. It was a time of intense
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spirituality. It was not until the conscious rejection
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of Victorian morality during the Roaring Twenties that
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crime went up. This was the era when Sigmund Freud's
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views were coming into vogue among "thinking"
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Americans: people weren't evil, just misguided or
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mistreated, or they required better environments. Sin
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was regarded as a lot of religious claptrap.
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The crime rate did not decline again until the
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Great Depression, a time of people banding together in
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the face of crisis. Wilson concluded, therefore, that
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crime was in large part caused by a breakdown of
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morality. Since 1965 the crime rate has steadily risen.
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In the same period, religious faith has waned. We have
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told people there are no absolutes and that they are
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not responsible for their own behavior. They are simply
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victims of a system that isn't working anymore and they
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don't have to worry about it because the government is
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going to fix it for them. We thought that in this brave
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new world we could create the perfect secular utopia.
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But the secular utopia is in reality the nightmare we
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see as we walk through the dark, rotten holes we call
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prisons all across America.
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In this context, it always amazes me when I listen
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to politicians say, "We are going to win the war on
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drugs by building prisons, appointing more judges, and
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putting more police on the beat. I remember when
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President Bush announced the "War on Drugs." Having
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spent seven months in prison, there wasn't one night
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that I did not smell marijuana burning. If you can get
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marijuana into a prison, with watchtowers, inspections,
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and prison guards, you can get it into a country. You
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can send the U.S. Marines to Colombia to burn all the
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fields, seal all the borders, and build all the prisons
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you want, but you won't stop drug use in this country
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because it isn't a problem of supply; it is a problem
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of demand. When there is no greater value in the lives
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of so many people than simply fulfilling individual
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desires and gratifications, then crime and drug abuse
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become inevitable. The soaring crime rate is powerful
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testimony to the failure of the city of man, deprived
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of the moral influence of the City of God.
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If we cannot be good without God, how do we
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sustain public virtue in society? We cannot do it
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through the instrument of politics. Alasdair MacIntyre,
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moral philosopher at Notre Dame, says that "Politics
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has become civil war carried on by other means."
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Without moral authority to call upon, our elected
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leaders are reduced to saying, "We can't say that this
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is right and that's wrong. We simply prefer that you
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wouldn't murder." And crime and drug abuse are not the
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only results of this loss of moral authority. Forty-
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four percent of the baby boomers say that there is no
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cause that would lead them to fight and die for their
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country.
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In the city of man, there is no moral consensus,
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and without a moral consensus there can be no law.
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Chairman Mao expressed the alternative well: in his
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view, morality begins at the muzzle of a gun.
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There has never been a case in history in which a
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society has been able to survive for long without a
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strong moral code. And there has never been a time when
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a moral code has not been informed by religious truth.
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Recovering our moral code--our religious truth--is the
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only way our society can survive. The heaping ash
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remains at Auschwitz, the killing fields of Southeast
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Asia, and the frozen wastes of the gulag remind us that
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the city of man is not enough; we must also seek the
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City of God.
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---------------------------------------------
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Charles Colson, former special counsel to President
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Richard Nixon, is a highly acclaimed author, speaker,
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and commentator. He is founder and chairman of Prison
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Fellowship, a ministry devoted to helping prisoners,
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ex-prisoners, victims, and their families. Born Again,
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Colson's international best seller, detailed his
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conversion to Christianity in 1973. His other widely
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read books include Life Sentence, Loving God, Who
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Speaks for God?, Kingdoms in Conflict, Against the
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Night, The God of Stones and Spiders, The Body (with
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Ellen Vaughan), and Why America Doesn't Work (with Jack
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Eckerd). He also writes a regular column for
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Christianity Today and appears regularly in the
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national press and on radio and television. He is the
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recipient of the 1993 Templeton Prize for Progress in
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Religion.
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###
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+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
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End of this issue of Imprimis, On Line; Information
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about the electronic publisher, Applied Foresight,
|
|
Inc., is in the file, IMPR_BY.TXT
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