I have rights!

Nature's Rights... Terry Dashner (www.ffcba.com) What provided the basis for America's liberty? You might be surprised to know, but America's concept of liberty and equal justice before the law were concepts that went back to the glorious days of Rome. In short natural law provided the basis for liberty, and natural law--as understood by our forefathers--was used by the Romans as a basis for a legal system with which to govern people in different countries, which they conquered. The idea of natural law was not new to our forefathers of the 18th century. Nor was it new to the 17th century. It had come to the fore in ancient Rome, had been greatly revived in the High Middle Ages, and philosophers and thinkers began to focus on it increasingly in the 17th century. The division of Christendom after the Protestant Reformation may have provided the impetus for this renewed interest. Men turned to natural law in the quest for a new basis of unity in a European civilization no longer held together by a common faith in the Roman Catholic Church. You see if the Romans were to rule diverse peoples justly, they had to do so on the basis of something broader than customs, traditions, and laws of the people so governed. What they hit upon were the natural laws, the laws that apply to people everywhere if they would have order and security, the natural laws of justice. After the Enlightenment period sprang up in Western Europe in the 17th century, natural laws came to refer to all those regularities that are to be found in the universe, in the nature of man, the lower animals, plants, and which apply to the behavior of all natural objects. So when we read the Declaration of Independence, it's no accident that the words "nature" and "nature's law" are used with expressive meaning, especially to the sages of that day. The authors of the greatest document ever written were writing about the very essence of man when culture, tradition, and social-economic standings were eliminated. As man stood raw before his Creator, he was endowed with certain basic rights that could not be denied him by government, tyranny, or another man. Man's rights are God given rights. I wonder if the ACLU has been advised of this basic premise of Western Civilization? Why do I say that? I say it because there seems to be a move by the pundits and so called protectors of the First Amendment to argue otherwise. It seems the history they want to write for the West, specifically for America, is a history revised. They want us to believe that our forefathers wanted nothing to do with mixing God and government. But the facts are that America was and has always been a nation who recognizes the utter need of God's Providence in the affairs and, especially, the fair government of men. Pastor T.