{"id":6862,"date":"2017-07-04T06:47:29","date_gmt":"2017-07-04T12:47:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/janetheactuary\/?p=6862"},"modified":"2017-07-03T23:10:39","modified_gmt":"2017-07-04T05:10:39","slug":"independence-day-american-dream","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/janetheactuary\/2017\/07\/independence-day-american-dream.html","title":{"rendered":"Independence Day and the “other” American Dream"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

\"DSC_0246b\"<\/p>\n

My son will be applying to college next year, which means that stories of college students protesting America as a vile, unjust place are particularly likely to catch my eye. \u00a0And at the same time, in the run-up to Independence Day, Jake Tapper is tweeting out photographs of American soldiers submitted by followers. \u00a0(As it happens, my dad is a vet, though his time in the military was spent happily in Germany, in-between Korea and Vietnam; he was commissioned as a second lieutenant after ROTC in college, used his mechanic\u2019s skills to supervise a vehicle repair depot, and, so far as I can tell, spent his off-hours travelling the country at a time when the salary of a young, single American officer stretched pretty far.)<\/p>\n

In the meantime, on Sunday at church we sang the usual patriotic songs, America the Beautiful and The Battle Hymn of the Republic. \u00a0And, look, maybe I get too emotional, but I got a little weepy at the latter song.<\/p>\n

No matter how much historians (and ordinary Americans) argue about whether the Civil War had as its objective freeing the slaves (or, for the South, preserving slavery), or preserving the Union (or, conversely, independence for the South), it is true that for a meaningful portion of the population (and I\u2019m not going to propose percentages), it mattered a great deal that slavery should end. \u00a0Here are the lyrics, per Wikipedia<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord;
\nHe is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored;
\nHe hath loosed the fateful lightning of His terrible swift sword:
\nHis truth is marching on.<\/p>\n

(Chorus)
\nGlory, Glory, hallelujah!
\nGlory, glory, hallelujah!
\nGlory, glory, hallelujah!
\nHis truth is marching on.<\/p>\n

I have seen Him in the watch-fires of a hundred circling camps,
\nThey have builded Him an altar in the evening dews and damps;
\nI can read His righteous sentence by the dim and flaring lamps:
\nHis day is marching on.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

And so, too, in the World Wars, and even now in Iraq and Afghanistan. \u00a0We talk about American soldiers defending our freedom, but it\u2019s really much bigger than that: \u00a0the American Dream that we celebrate on Independence Day is only partly about political independence from Great Britain. \u00a0The more important piece is the sacrifice that so many have made in our history for, not our freedom, but the freedom of others.<\/p>\n

I mean, sure, there\u2019s the \u201cregular\u201d American Dream of becoming prosperous by dint of hard work, in the model of Thomas Edison and Henry Ford. \u00a0But you don\u2019t get teary-eyed about Thomas Edison.<\/p>\n

And slavery is a huge stain on our country. \u00a0But in the same way as, on someone\u2019s birthday, you don\u2019t contemplate all the times they were really kind of a jerk, and at an anniversary, you don\u2019t dwell on the arguments you\u2019ve had, and at a retirement party, you\u2019d be horrified if the the boss started piling on complaints, so, too, Independence Day is a day to celebrate those ideals, and the people who have worked to put them into practice.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Image: \u00a0own photograph.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

My son will be applying to college next year, which means that stories of college students protesting America as a vile, unjust place are particularly likely to catch my eye. \u00a0And at the same time, in the run-up to Independence Day, Jake Tapper is tweeting out photographs of American soldiers submitted by followers. \u00a0(As it […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2209,"featured_media":2321,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[677,676],"class_list":["post-6862","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-freedom","tag-independence-day"],"yoast_head":"\nIndependence Day and the "other" American Dream<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Independence Day is a day to celebrate those ideals, and the people who have worked to put them into practice.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, 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