Politigous — Part III Through the Constitution

Politigous – Part III(1,220)

Through the Constitution

July 27th, 2011

People just love to stomp around and act like they are the ones that have discovered the “great truth.” The politigous does this by constantly talking about the Constitution. You would think that the Constitution of the United States of America was written by the finger of God. As you know, it wasn’t. It was written by men who moved on the understanding they had at the time—to try to forge a document which would externalize the internal desires they had to build a nation of free people.

I think it’s humorous when people debate what the “framers of the Constitution” had in mind. Although they were very learned men for their time, none of them had ever flown in a jet airplane. None of them knew anything about antibiotics or even advanced treatments for cancer. None of them had a full comprehension of what it meant to grant civil rights to all individuals. None of them could imagine an Internet with trillions of loggings for billions of people. None of them thought human beings could drive over 60 miles per hour in any type of vehicle without suffocating. Many of them still believed in witches and thought farming was the sole occupation of integrity.

So even if we do discover what the original framers of the Constitution felt about certain matters, it does not bring the document current with our times without intelligent, spirit-led leaders who have the sensitivity to update for the good of the people.

It’s about justice—and justice, to me, is like a tree: it consists of a trunk and branches. Certainly I would agree that the Constitution of the United States is the trunk. And most of the wood in a tree is in the trunk. We were given a fine foundation to begin our journey as a nation. But most of the beauty of the tree of justice is in the branches. After all, a series of trunks does not a forest make. What makes a tree look like a tree are its branches.

Twenty-seven times we, the people, have had to go in and correct the Constitution, supplement the Constitution and amend the Constitution in order to meet the needs of human beings. It is a beautiful process.

Let’s look at it more closely. The original document contained the words that people who had black skin were not to be counted as a whole individual. It was later amended to admit that this was erred—that they should be given full rights as complete humans. And then it was still later amended to grant them equality without segregation.

An amendment was made to the Constitution to prohibit alcohol. The failed experiment was later amended by another amendment—repealing the previous one.

We have grown.

The twenty-sixth amendment says that the voting age should be eighteen years. This occurred in a time when we were asking people arriving at that particular life experience to go to war—when we wouldn’t even let them vote. It seemed ridiculous. So we changed it.

The politigous wants to extol the glory of the Constitution, but it is not through the Constitution that we have become a great nation. It is through discovering the spirit of freedom, the spirit of acceptance, the spirit of openness, the spirit of inclusion and the spirit of welcoming that we have amended our own words to allow everyone to be encompassed under the great tent of America.

We have branched out from our original trunk to create greater beauty.

Anyone who extols the founding fathers over becoming the fathers who are finding ways to make our nation better for our people now is a deterrent from allowing the beauty of freedom to grow in the spirit.

We see the need in our legal system. There are more men and women in prison for using drugs than for murder. It is something we will have to deal with. Is it possible for us to lessen the punishment for misuse of narcotics without either condoning the practice or legalizing it? What will make us a great nation is finding the right spirit to induce that debate towards a better human end.

We must find out how to once and for all make bigotry forbidden in our nation instead of hiding behind archaic laws that allow for the mistreatment of one another. What spirit can we conjure in ourselves for goodness and mercy—to begin this search?

The politigous wants to talk about the Constitution instead of discussing the spirit of America, which is to move always toward justice and freedom for all.

Now, the job still gets done. It’s just that the politigous makes the process very painful, drags it out and many people get hurt because they lack the basic dignity of pursuing their happiness. I am certainly not suggesting that we do away with laws or reject the Constitution. I’m just saying that a document that has been amended twenty-seven times is probably going to need another go-over yet again.

It’s just that simple—and to try to strictly follow the wording and legalism of a dream we call America is to remove the spirit of the patriots who died for the cause. No one who gave their life at Gettysburg knew exactly every little, subtle nuance that would be necessary to make this a great nation. But they did understand that the country was being threatened by a sense of false loyalty and oppression—and without stopping these two nasty pieces of nonsense, the nation just might perish.

I don’t understand what will be necessary to keep the United States of America going forward, but I do recognize that the next great awareness will be achieved through finding the spirit of the Constitution instead of upholding the letter of the law. The Constitution of the United States is like faith in God—it is a living, breathing organism that demands the daily bread of discovery to nourish its loins.

Yes, the Constitution is the trunk of the tree providing the most wood, but the amendments are the beauty of the branches. What will be the next amendment? What will be the next wind that blows in spirit, demanding freedom and justice for all? You can not accidentally discover the spirit. Jesus said you must “ask, seek and knock.” There must truly be an active pursuit—a search party, if you will—to find the spirit of the law instead of just the letter. Here are three ways I would suggest that we, as a people, stay in the spirit of Americainstead of merely revering the Constitution:

1. Never silence the voice of someone who wants freedom. You may not agree with him; you may not like his lifestyle or nationality. But when we silence the voice of another, we gradually open the door to silencing our own.

2. Never accept things as they are if there’s a possibility for making them better. Despair is not an American virtue. We are not a people who believe there is no recourse. The recent introduction of despair into our society is the admission that we have run out of creative ideas to improve ourselves. Nothing could be more un-American.

3. Finally, don’t welcome change, don’t fear change—just allow change. Change will happen whether you like it or not. When it’s obvious that change is in the wind, learn its benefits and get behind its better parts. That is really the best we can do as believers and Americans.

When you remove these three practices from the dream that we call “Old Glory,” you begin to create just a government—without allowing for the expansion and needs of its people—and that is too bland and predictable to be America.

So the politigous talks about the Constitution and fails to understand that twenty-seven times we have found a new spirit, to breath life into an aging carcass.

God bless America. God bless the spirit that makes America work.