31 March 2018

Alma 44:5 - Liberty and Loyalty from Captain Moroni

I return again to my "gleaning" from recent scripture study.
And now, Zerahemnah, I command you, in the name of that all-powerful God, who has strengthened our arms that we have gained power over you, by our faith, by our religion, and by our rites of worship, and by our church, and by the sacred support which we owe to our wives and our children, by that liberty which binds us to our lands and our country; yea, and also by the maintenance of the sacred word of God, to which we owe all our happiness; and by all that is most dear unto us— (Alma 44:5)
It seems that Moroni, who speaks here, finds that liberty binds up to our lands and country. With the recent spate of immigration away from Syria and toward Western Europe, it is a principle that we see in our own day. Where there is little liberty, there is little loyalty.

Again, It is liberty that binds us to our lands and our country. As social engineers formulate restrictions to individual, family, and group liberties in order to punish perceived racial or political wrongs, the overall loyalty to even “the American country” wanes. For example, in what was once considered only the province of the extreme fringe, secessionist movements are becoming more mainstream through a push toward increased “states’ rights” and a stronger desire for devolution of power from larger centralized parties that see people more as statistical polling numbers to be manipulated.

America itself was always and continues to be an interesting conglomeration. Neither a nation or country based on any one heritage, it could be seen as a modern attempt at a "world" government, or a system that can govern over many disparate peoples. In theory, each family can do "their own thing" and still enjoy the benefits that liberty affords them under the American umbrella. However, that liberty has be be authentic and supported for all, not enforced just for a few "oppressed" groups and denied to the socially-undeserving and "privileged" others.

Liberty for all can and should be fought for at every turn and in every place. In the United States of America, it is traditionally considered the underlying right of everyone. It was the grand principle that God established for all of this children, to facilitate our growth and development.  Let us not so piously battle to suspend universal liberty after it was so passionately enthroned by the American founding fathers and even established by our Eternal Father. Liberty is the higher road and deserves our every loyalty.