#is

The decline and fall of the modern religious right's notion of a Christian America creates a calmer political environment and, for many believers, may help open the way for a more theologically serious religious life. ↗

— Jon Meacham

#believers #calmer #christian #creates #decline

The fact is that America has been at her most prosperous when government and the private sector have been not at war, but in a wary, if often underplayed, alliance. History is unmistakable on this point. ↗

— Jon Meacham

#america #been #fact #government #her

The past always seems somehow more golden, more serious, than the present. We tend to forget the partisanship of yesteryear, preferring to re-imagine our history as a sure and steady march toward greatness. ↗

— Jon Meacham

#forget #golden #greatness #history #march

The power of the American system of republicanism lies in its capacity to allow religious belief to be a competing, not a controlling, factor in American life. ↗

— Jon Meacham

#american #american life #belief #capacity #competing

Whenever there is news of a terrible shooting, I wonder why America has so miserably failed to enact even common-sense gun legislation. ↗

— Jon Meacham

#common-sense #enact #even #failed #gun

Whether one believes or not, religion is as real a force in the life of the world as economics or politics, and it demands fair-minded attention. Even if you think the entire religious enterprise is at best misguided and at worst counterproductive, it remains vital, inspiring great good and, sometimes, great evil. ↗

— Jon Meacham

#believes #best #counterproductive #demands #economics

While we remain a nation decisively shaped by religious faith, our politics and our culture are, in the main, less influenced by movements and arguments of an explicitly Christian character than they were even five years ago. I think this is a good thing - good for our political culture. ↗

— Jon Meacham

#ago #character #christian #culture #decisively

Whoever rises to deliver the inaugural Address of 2013 will speak to a nation in which the American Dream is under profound economic and cultural pressure. This is perhaps best measured by the state of the middle class. ↗

— Jon Meacham

#american #american dream #best #class #cultural

With the perspective afforded by the passage of time, where does 9/11 rank as a turning point in our national history? For the victims and their families, innocents going about their lives, suddenly and brutally murdered, no other day can ever matter as much. ↗

— Jon Meacham

#afforded #brutally #day #does #ever

To be interested in the public good we must be disinterested, that is, not interested in goods in which our personal selves are wrapped up. ↗

— George H. Mead

#good #goods #interested #must #not interested