Quotes from a Patriotic Rosary

For the last several years the 4^th degree Knights of Columbus sponsor a “Patriotic Rosary” service at our parish. The core principle of the 4^th degree is “patriotism” and we are charged with standing up for God and country. The patriotic rosary is an effort to mobilize a community prayer for our nation and its leaders because as a nation we are in dire straits. We pray for the intercession of our Holy Mother Mary to help us.

As part of the rosary, quotes from founding fathers and early patriots are read that support our need for God’s intervention in our nation. Those quotes are very apropos to the challenges facing us today especially in regard to both the subtle and direct attacks on religious freedom expressed and accepted in our culture. Those early patriots speak for themselves and no comment is required.

“The Great Governor of the Universe has led us too long and too far…to forsake us. By folly and improper conduct… we may now and then get bewildered; but I hope and trust that there is good sense and virtue enough to recover the right path before we shall be entirely lost.” – George Washington,1788

“To the kindly influence of Christianity we owe that degree of civil freedom… which mankind now enjoys. In proportion to the genuine effects of Christianity are diminished in any nation, either through unbelief or the corruption of its doctrines, or the neglect of its institutions; in the same proportion will the people of that nation recede from the blessings of genuine freedom, and approximate the miseries of complete despotism. All efforts to destroy the foundation of our holy religion ultimately tend to the subversion also of political freedom and happiness. Whenever the pillars of Christianity shall be overthrown, our present republican forms of government, and all the blessings which flow from them, may fall with them.”  Jedediah Morse, 1799 (early American educator)

“It may be the will of Heaven that America shall suffer calamities … and distresses yet more dreadful. If this is to be the case, it will have this good effect…: it will inspire us with many virtues, which we have not, and correct many errors, follies and vices which threaten to disturb, dishonor and destroy us. …But I must submit all my hopes and fears to an overruling Providence; in which, unfashionable as the faith may be, I firmly believe”. John Adams, 1776