A Nation Under God

Living into our equality

A note about this essay: This is the text of an address I was honored to give to my local community during our celebration of Independence Day, July 4, 2023. Happy 4th to all my American readers!

Our flag waving high above the community as we celebrate America’s independence

We have entered an era of accelerating change. The political winds have grown fierce, the economic landscape is trembling, cultural battles are escalating, and institutional trust is crumbling. So today I want to spend a few minutes reflecting on what it means to live as a nation under God. 

You may recognize that phrase from the Pledge of Allegiance and know the words “under God” weren’t added to the original text until 1954. But that phrase “nation under God” was used nearly a century earlier by Abraham Lincoln in the closing lines of his Gettysburg address, where he honored those who had given “the last full measure of devotion” in the cause of preserving our nation. I think it's worth pondering the implications of that phrase as we celebrate the birth of a country unique in human history because it was formed around an idea. 

Consider, for a moment, the strangeness of that. The improbability. It was nothing so basic and unifying—so natural—as shared language or geography, as shared ethnicity or culture or religion through which America came into being. Rather, this country was shaped through a singular concept that emerged out of the Enlightenment about human beings and our relationship to our Maker. In a nutshell: God doesn't play favorites; He creates every human being equal in His eyes. 

This means each of us arrives in this world Divinely endowed with “certain unalienable Rights” among which are the well-known “Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.” Also, specifically implicit in this concept of de facto human rights—and extending from their Divine endowment—is our right as individuals to be recognized and treated as equals under the law. Because God doesn’t play favorites. 

Of course, we all know that from its inception and throughout most of its relatively brief history, America has fallen conspicuously short of that inspired ideal. But as birthday celebrations are arguably not the moment to dwell on the failures of the honoree, let's simply acknowledge that America’s record on respecting those unalienable rights has been tragically flawed, egregiously so, even while we recognize that America’s foundational concept has been a game-changer for humanity. Millions upon millions of lives have been uplifted out of oppression, out of poverty, out of hopelessness by its impact. By its fundamental truth resonating around our world and across the distance of two and half centuries, opening minds and changing norms. 

Truly, a gift of Providence to humankind.

So, what does it mean for us today, in 2023, to live as a nation of equals under God? I ask because in our current moment, and with a new election season approaching, we can—and do—find a lot to disagree on. Around America, within our churches, communities, and families, diverging perceptions of history and conflicting notions of virtue vie for space and primacy. A lot feels at stake. 

I think it’s useful to consider that the very One who created us equal also gave us the essential instruction on how to live into that equality: by loving each other as He loves all of us; treating each other as we all wish to be treated. Which is to say: by offering one another the generosity, patience, forgiveness, and mercy that He extends to each of us—that we all would have others extend to ourselves. The question for each of us is: How seriously do I take this instruction on equality? Do I lead by example—His example?

But—we might wonder—what about right and wrong? What about protecting innocence, standing against hate, defending the weak? How do we fight the power of falsity, of lies, with love? How do we live in charity with everyone but still stand against the destruction and suffering we see others cause?

An important answer can be found, I think, in a truth that was painfully realized by Alexander Solzhenitsyn, the Soviet exile who, for the “crime” of privately criticizing Josef Stalin, went from serving as a decorated Red Army officer to languishing for a decade in the brutality of a Soviet prison camp. In his famous work The Gulag Archipelago, he says: 

In my most evil moments I was convinced that I was doing good, and I was well supplied with systematic arguments. And it was only when I lay there on rotting prison straw that I sensed within myself the first stirrings of good. Gradually it was disclosed to me that the line separating good and evil passes not through states, nor between classes, nor between political parties either—but right through every human heart—and through all human hearts.

So, we are equal in this, also. And it’s worth remembering. Because as the personal increasingly becomes the political, we’re seeing fellowship and goodwill receding into camps, withdrawing behind the lines of tribal dogmas. We can feel the rising tide of antipathy around us, of righteous othering, with its rip currents of blame and contempt that seek to pull us under. 

Solzhenitsyn’s words are important because they recall us to the most basic level of our equality: the shared imperfection of our being. They bring home the truth that no one can claim the side of good who fails to look for it in others; no one can claim to stand against evil who cannot find it in himself. The most important battle to be won is not any of those raging around us. The line we most need to hold is in our own hearts.

Living as a nation under God is a call to recognize our spiritual equality, and embrace it. This does not mean pretending our conflicts don’t exist, that everything’s good and there’s nothing worthy of dispute. Being a nation under God means attending to the ground we stand on as we engage. Can we keep spiritually awake to that boundary within ourselves? Can we mindfully cultivate the humility of spirit that looks for the humanity in our adversaries? Find the courage of heart to reach out and connect with it across our tribal divides? 

America’s unique legacy as a nation is that we coalesced around an inspired idea. That belief, in our Divinely endowed equality, was the philosophical seed out of which grew the American ethos of liberty and justice for all. Being unavoidably flawed human beings, we will not—we cannot—live our ideals perfectly. But we can uphold our legacy by seeking to walk the path our Maker has outlined for us. . . as individuals, as a society, as a nation under God. 

He has shown you, O man, what is good;
And what does the Lord require of you
But to do justly,
And to love mercy,
And to walk humbly with your God? 

MICAH 6:8