Basic HTML Version
TheTruth
Behind
ERICA'S
LCRISIS
by
Gene H. Hogberg
An all-out assault on spiritual values and the family is reaping a bitter harvest.
T
HE ROLE
of religion and
morality in modern
society emerged as a big
issue in the 1984 election
campaign in the United
States.
Religion and politics-or reli–
g ion
versus
pol itics, as sorne
view it-threatens to become an
even more explosive issue dur–
ing President Ronald Reagan's
second term.
During the ' 84 campaign, Presi–
dent Reagan found himself at the
heart of the swirling cont'roversy.
He carne out strongly against the
continuance of legalized abortion,
permitted under a 1973 Supreme
Court decision. He also endorsed
voluntary prayer in the nation's
public schools. Until another
Supreme Court decision, this time
in 1962, opening-day prayers in
American public school classrooms
had been commÓnplace. ·
Mr. Reagan reacted forcefully to
charges from those who worried
about whetber bis position on tbese
two issues undermined the guaran–
tees provided for in the Firs t
Amendment to the U.S. Constitu–
tion. The Constitution declares that
"Congress shall make no law
respecting an establishment of reli-
2
gion, or prohibiting the exercise
thereof."
The President's response was
that the issue was not one of "es–
tablishing religion" but rather one
of rekindling a traditional sense of
religious-based public morality.
Appeal to Values
In a speech before the Economic
Club of Chicago, the President
declared that the nation had lived
through a "hedonistic heyday" of
false values. l n the past few decades,
he said, "Many of us turned away
from the enduring values, the faith,
the work ethic and the central
importance of the family."
During the Republican conven–
tion in Dallas, M r. Reagan ap–
peared before a prayer breakfast. In
bis speech he said: We establish no
religion in this country nor will we
ever... . But we poison our society
when we remove its theological
underpinnings. "
In the 1960s, said the President,
"We began to make great steps in
secularizing our nation.... With–
out God there is no virtue. Without
God we are mired in the materi–
al ... without God democracy will
not and cannot long endure. "
Many, of course, disagreed with
the President's analysis. Sorne
accused him of playing into the
hands of the "Religious Rigbt" in
an attempt to force a change of
moral dLrection in tbe country.
Collapse of Religious Guidance
Other influential circles, however,
have been echoing the President 's
concerns.
On March 20, 1984,
The Wa/1
Street Journal
carried a powerful
lead editorial condemning the mor–
al decay in the country over the
past two decades. Significantiy, the
editors placed a great deal of the
blame at the doorstep of organized
mainline religion for not standing
up to the rising tides of immorality.
The fact that this powerful editorial
appeared in a leading business dai–
ly, rather than in a religious publi–
cation, says something about the
state of religion in America today.
The editorial said:
" Basically what bappened is that
the new morality of big cities such
as New York, Los Angeles and San
Francisco was imposed on the rest
of the country by movies, TV, mag–
azines, advertising, music, novel–
ists, playwrights and, thro ugb
default, by organized religion."
American parents, continued the
Journal
editors, especially needed
counterarguments to battle the
inroads of "aggressive modern sec–
ularism" in order to restore moral
The
PLAIN TRUTH