Patriot’s day.
You may be expecting something cheesy or sad - the usual writings of people on days of memorial, but I am not going to deliver on this expectation.
In large part, I do not like days of patriotic celebration - for the same reasons I do not like those bumper sticker that say support our troops, those little cheap flags people stick in their yards every now and then and other things like that because I find that when people do things like this, they feel like they are fulfilling their civic duty; they say, “I support the troops; I’m patriotic;” they do so little for the welfare of their country yet buy off as patriotic people. The same goes for ‘patriots day’ and the fourth of July. People are patriotic two or three days out of the year and call it good when they ought to do so much more every day for the welfare of their nation.
I daresay that Ezra Taft Benson agrees; he says, “If America is destroyed, it may be by Americans who salute the flag, sing the national anthem, march in patriotic parades, cheer Fourth of July speakers - normally good Americans who fail to comprehend what is required to keep our country strong and free - Americans who have been lulled away into a false security.” (April 1968, General Conference Report) Think about it, if a person thinks they have done enough to keep their country ’strong and free,’ they certainly won’t seek out better ways to serve that purpose; they will be completely complacent.
Don’t get me wrong, I love this country; I love this country with all my heart and freedom even more. I, more than most, think we ought to celebrate and work to preserve our blessings of freedom and faith in this nation. I only disagree with how monotonous our so called celebrating has become. We ought to be more patriotic every day than we are on the two days of the year we focus on it. Our freedom relies on an awake patriotic citizenry. I think in large part that we have forgotten what it truly means to be patriotic in this country; we have forgotten to stand for principles, liberty and the author thereof and now stand for legislations, programs, presidents and socialism. We “fail to comprehend what is required to keep our country strong and free.”
So in memory of 9/11, I am so sorry for the families of those who died in the assault - those who have suffered and mourned for their losses. It was a tragedy that was horrific and without mercy, but I hope it will be a point at where many Americans wake up and start fighting to make this country as great as it once was - when freedom and peace were found overflowing.
In closing I quote Abe Lincoln when he said, “Whence shall we expect the approach of danger? Shall some transatlantic giant step the earth and crush us at a blow? Never. All the armies of Europe and Asia could not by force take a drink from the Ohio River, or make a track on Blue Ridge in the trial of a thousand years. If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of free men, we shall live forever, or die by suicide.”
A people that are mentally awake to the world around them, free to act how they please on their knowledge and have something to believe in enough to fight for could not ever be worried of any enemy, but we - as we have lost our faith - have become frightened on account of such small threats. We have become blinded by so many things, and it is my prayer that we may all wake up and start to cleanse this nation of all things impure before we even think of reaching outward.