Saturday, August 13, 2022

SDA History: When A.T. Jones Responded to Supreme Court Declaration of a "Christian Nation" 1892

I pray God that it may not be laid to their charge.
2 Timothy 4:16
 
"The court not only declares that this is a "religious nation," but that
it is a "Christian nation." 
The people, therefore, are not only religious but they are Christians-yes, Jews, infidels, and all. 
Q: For is not the Supreme Court the highest judicial authority in the United States? 
Q:  and when this court lays it down as the supreme law-as the meaning of the Constitution-that the people are religious, and are Christians, then does not that settle the question?
A: Not at all. 
---The very absurdity of the suggestion only demonstrates that the court can have nothing at all to do with any such matters, and shows how completely the court transcended its powers and went out of the right way. 
No; 
men are not made religious by law
nor by judicial decision
nor by historical precedents 
 
"The commission to Christopher Columbus, prior to his sail
westward, is from 'Ferdinand and Isabella, by the grace of God, king and queen of Castile,' etc., and recites that 'it is hoped that by God's assistance some of the continents and islands in the ocean will be discovered,' etc
."
Q: What religion did Ferdinand and Isabella have in mind when they issued that document? 
Q: What religion did they profess? 
A: The Catholic religion, to be sure. 
---And not only that, it was the Catholic religion with the Inquisition in full swing; for it was Ferdinand and Isabella who established the Inquisition in Spain under the generalship of Torquemada, and who, because Spain was a "Christian nation," sentenced to confiscation of all goods and to banishment every Jew who would not turn Catholic
 
*And this is the first piece of "historical" authority by which the Supreme Court of the United States adjudges American citizens "to be a religious people," and by which that court decides that this is a "Christian nation."
A.T. Jones