Happy Fourth of July. Here’s to the birthday of our country and the courage of the men who risked their all. They took a bold step in proclaiming independence from England. It was not undertaken lightly and it is our duty to continue to uphold the truths that “all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” The writers of the Declaration may have limited their scope of ‘men’ to free and white and male because they were products of the 18th Century. Our call is to enlarge that promise to include all humans no matter color, creed, or gender.
As it says in the last paragraph of the Declaration of
Independence, the action of the Declaration was done “with a firm reliance
on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our
lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor.”
We have a ways to go before the dream of the Founding
Fathers is truth, but we can work each day for equity and justice. We can work
to elect honest, forward-looking leaders who will work for the good of all. And
we can do our part in creating “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”
