NP Asscroft Speaks

[Mark David Tristan Brenchley]

On Tue, 30 Jan 2001, s~Z wrote:

> Here is the text of John Ashcroft's much-maligned speech at Bob Jones
> University...
> 
> I want to thank each one of you for investing yourselves in the
> mission of Christ, of redemption and forgiveness, and for preparing
> yourselves in the way that you have.
> 
> A slogan of the American Revolution, which was so distressing to the
> emissaries of the king that it was found in correspondence sent back
> to England, was the line, "We have no king but Jesus."
> 
> Tax collectors came asking for that which belonged to the king, and
> colonists frequently said, "We have no king but Jesus." It found its
> way into the fundamental documents of this great country.
> 
> You could quote the Declaration (of Independence) with me: "We hold
> these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal and
> endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights."
> 
> Unique among the nations, America recognized the source of our
> character as being godly and eternal, not being civic and temporal.
> And because we have understood that our source is eternal, America has
> been different.
> 
> We have no king but Jesus. My mind, thinking about that once, raced
> back a couple of thousand years when Pilate stepped before the people
> in Jerusalem and said, "Who would you have that I release unto you,
> Barabbas or Jesus, which is called the Christ." And when they said,
> "Barabbas," he said, "What about Jesus, the king of the Jews?"
> The outcry was, "We have no king but Caesar."
> 
> There's a difference between a culture that has no king but Caesar, no
> standard but the civil authority, and a culture that has no king but
> Jesus, no standard but the eternal authority.
> 
> When you have no king but Caesar, you release Barabbas, criminality,
> destruction, thievery, the lowest and the least. When you have no king
> but Jesus, you release the eternal, you release the highest and the
> best, you release virtue, you release potential.
> It is not accidental that America has been the home of the brave and
> the land of the free, the place where mankind has had the greatest of
> all opportunities to approach the potential that God has placed within
> us. It has been because we knew that we were endowed, not by the king,
> but by the creator, with certain inalienable rights.
> 
> If America is to be great in the future, it will be if we understand
> that our source is not civic and temporal, but our source is godly and
> eternal, endowed by the creator with rights of life, liberty and the
> pursuit of happiness.
> 
> I thank God for this institution and for you who recognize and commit
> yourselves to the proposition that we were so created and that to live
> with respect to the creator who promised us the greatest potential as
> a nation and as individuals. For such, we must reacquaint ourselves
> daily with his call upon our lives.
> 
> Thank you, God bless you and thank you for honoring me. God bless you,
> everyone.

	"Twat".