Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - Ep 4 ｜ The Christian Case for American Patriotism (+ Cat Facts)

00:00:00.000 Hey guys, welcome to the podcast. I'm Allie. I am the host of this podcast, obviously,

00:00:05.760 but I'm also a host at CRTV.com. I hope that everyone is having the best week of their entire

00:00:11.940 lives. And if not, I hope that you are at least having a good week or even an adequate week.

00:00:16.860 And even if you're having the worst week ever, I hope that this podcast right here

00:00:21.260 makes your week better. Today, we are going to talk about something very serious. We are going

00:00:28.420 to talk about cats and how to know whether or not your cat is allergic to the essential oils that

00:00:35.540 you are diffusing in your home. I'm totally kidding. If this is your first time to this

00:00:39.900 podcast, like you probably already turned it off by now. I'm kidding. I just made that up. I just

00:00:45.300 wanted to say that because I've actually been thinking about that subject recently. I did just

00:00:49.500 find out that cats are allergic to essential oils and I became really distressed about this

00:00:54.200 because we have these air wick plugins that are supposedly essential oils. And I was worrying

00:00:58.900 that we're poisoning Rachel McAdams and sweatpants, AKA Cat Damon. And the ending to this story that I'm

00:01:04.860 telling you for absolutely no reason is not that I found out that they will be fine. I didn't actually

00:01:10.160 find that out. I just found out something worse. I learned that these things are probably bad for me

00:01:14.440 too. Like, did you know that these air freshener companies do not have to tell you at all anywhere,

00:01:20.840 not online, not on the back of the packages, what the ingredients in air freshener is like,

00:01:25.560 that's weird. I feel like it's not okay. So I just don't know what to do. Here's my dilemma.

00:01:30.420 I don't want my cat or I don't want my house to smell like cat litter. I actually don't want my cat

00:01:36.380 to smell like cat litter either. So that works. The question is, do I allow my house to smell like cat

00:01:42.340 do-do and avoid being intoxicated by possibly deadly essential oil air fresheners? Or do I

00:01:48.740 keep my house smelling like lavender and just say, you know what, Jeremiah 29, 11, God knows the plans

00:01:53.440 he has for me. And if I die from air freshener, then so be it, you know, to live is Christ and to

00:01:58.160 die is gain. I don't know. I don't know. I'll let you guys weigh in. Message me on Instagram. Let me

00:02:05.440 know. Okay. That is enough of that. I'm really sorry. Again, if this is your first time,

00:02:10.480 that doesn't always happen. Sometimes it does. I just felt like I needed to share that with you,

00:02:14.900 but that rant was way too off base and long has nothing to do with what we're talking about.

00:02:19.780 What we're actually going to talk about today is this trend of being unpatriotic,

00:02:24.800 especially in the church and why that is incredibly stupid. So here we go.

00:02:29.740 So there's this really ignorant myth floating around in the church in particular that basically

00:02:46.700 says we cannot be patriotic and proud of America and be a Christian. The people who say things like

00:02:53.900 this also usually say things like, oh, Jesus was a socialist. They have this attitude that America

00:03:00.380 is bad because of slavery and stuff. So there's really no reason to be proud of it. And Jesus is

00:03:06.080 coming back anyway. So why should we even care about our country? Wouldn't it be more loving to

00:03:10.960 just have a government that like gives people stuff? These people tend to want us to be more like

00:03:16.820 Europe. They love Bernie Sanders. These happen to usually be the same people who believe that

00:03:22.000 unconditional tolerance is more important than preaching the actual gospel. These are what I

00:03:28.060 call social justice warrior Christians and they are ignorant. Now, to be fair, some Christians who

00:03:35.380 lack patriotism are not full on Bernie Sanders SJWs. They just look at our past and even our present

00:03:40.840 and they say rightfully so, hey, we are not perfect. We have done and still do some messed up stuff.

00:03:48.240 Our politicians are all corrupt and these people don't want to get on their

00:03:51.880 high horse about America because they know we have our own set of problems. So they just kind of

00:03:56.160 detach themselves from politics, learning about our history and talking about America because they

00:04:02.400 kind of feel guilty about it. This is an understandable view. I know a lot of very smart people like this,

00:04:08.420 but the problem is it still does not line up with reality. And then, of course, you have people who

00:04:15.240 are not religious at all who feel unpatriotic as well. But I always want to address the Christian

00:04:20.960 view because this is a Christian conservative millennial podcast. So first, to kind of give you

00:04:26.620 my perspective, let me back up a little bit and tell you about my relationship with patriotism.

00:04:32.740 I can't really call myself anything other than patriotic, not just like a little bit, but like

00:04:38.780 really patriotic. I love America. My husband can tell you that when we're seeing the Star Spangled

00:04:45.620 Banner, which it's not like in our living room, like if we're at a game or something, or even

00:04:49.700 when I say pledge allegiance to the flag, I almost always get tears in my eyes. Courtesy of the Red,

00:04:55.520 White, and Blue by Toby Keith is seriously one of my all-time favorite songs. I know some people

00:05:01.740 have qualms with the Hamilton musical, but I seriously cry when I listen to the first two songs

00:05:07.840 because it is such a beautiful depiction of the resolve of the American spirit. My parents really

00:05:14.560 instilled in me a love for our country and the knowledge that America is unique. I always knew

00:05:21.220 that it was an incredible privilege to be born in and grow up in a free country, although I may not

00:05:28.160 have always known what that really meant. Now, we hear the word privilege a lot nowadays. I said it was

00:05:35.920 a privilege to live in this country. When we hear the word privilege, it's typically used in a bad way.

00:05:41.060 If someone has privilege, they must be spoiled and totally blind to reality, but privilege isn't a

00:05:48.380 negative unless, because of your privilege, you're unable or unwilling to see the needs of those who

00:05:54.180 are worse off than you are. Privileges are gifts. They are blessings that we do not deserve. They can

00:05:59.520 be used to insulate us from the plight of other people, which is bad, or they can be used to actually

00:06:04.640 do something good and impactful. When my parents taught me that it's a privilege to live in America,

00:06:09.800 I knew that didn't just mean that I was lucky. It meant that I had a responsibility. I understood

00:06:14.960 from a really young age that I needed to do something with what I was given, because the

00:06:20.560 only thing worse than allowing your privilege to blind you to reality is to deny its existence

00:06:26.100 altogether, to take it for granted. That is what those who ignore America's greatness do. They fail to

00:06:32.120 appreciate the immense blessing that they have been given, and so they fail to use it in a way that

00:06:37.260 actually matters. A big reason I think my parents so naturally instilled patriotism into me was

00:06:45.140 because of their own story. It's part of who they are. It is who they are. So I'm going to give you a

00:06:51.440 brief rundown of where my parents came from and the journey that I think really, really well depicts

00:06:58.040 the American dream and the reason for the patriotism that I have. So my dad's mom, my grandma,

00:07:05.340 with whom I have always had a really close relationship with, was the second oldest of 13

00:07:10.120 kids. She grew up on a cotton farm in Louisiana. They made all of their own food, their own clothes.

00:07:15.640 As you can imagine, they were extremely, extremely poor. I once asked my grandmother a while ago if

00:07:22.500 they ever had any hired help, you know, around the house with the kids, cleaning, picking the cotton,

00:07:27.180 and she said we were the hired help. Neither of her parents were educated at all. Maybe the eighth

00:07:33.660 grade. My grandma was the first one in her family to graduate from high school. She was the first one 1.00

00:07:38.880 to go to college. She finished college. She went on to get her master's. She supported herself through

00:07:44.200 all of that. She became a teacher and she taught for 30 years. Really, her story alone is a testament to

00:07:51.200 what hard work gets you in America. But that's just kind of the preface to my parents' story.

00:07:56.780 She married my grandfather, who was a church band director his entire life. They had four kids

00:08:01.740 together, including my dad, of course. So they had a church salary and a teacher's salary. They got by.

00:08:08.220 They weren't destitute, but they certainly didn't have a lot, especially for a family of six.

00:08:13.720 Uh, my grandfather, as it turns out, unfortunately ended up being a really bad dad and husband.

00:08:21.180 And from what I hear, the kids didn't have a great childhood. Uh, my grandparents ended up getting a

00:08:27.500 divorce when my dad was a teenager. Switch over to my mom. My mom's mom got pregnant with her when she 0.99

00:08:34.360 was 18 and then she married my granddad. Uh, neither of them went to college. According to my mom,

00:08:40.860 her dad had lots of different jobs when she was growing up. Sometimes they would have money.

00:08:46.700 Sometimes they wouldn't. And, uh, when I say have money, I mean like enough to get by. Uh,

00:08:52.720 both of her parents drank heavily. She might not say that they were alcoholics, but they were

00:08:57.240 probably close. My mom talks about having to drive to the liquor store for her dad when she was 13 to

00:09:04.120 get him beer and cigarettes. Um, but unlike my dad's parents, my mom's parents actually loved each

00:09:10.640 other. And even though their marriage was volatile at times, apparently, uh, they did at the end of

00:09:17.260 the day, love each other and want to be together. Uh, my mom says that growing up around all of this,

00:09:23.620 one of her only goals in life, uh, was to not get married or pregnant as a teenager, not her only goal,

00:09:32.280 but one of her main goals in life. And she did it a month after she turned 20. She married my dad,

00:09:38.520 who was still 19 at the time they met in college in, uh, the small town in Arkansas, close to where

00:09:44.420 both of them lived. They dated for six months. I think they were also engaged for six months.

00:09:49.340 And then, uh, they got married in 1980, just a year after my dad's parents got divorced. They had

00:09:55.540 absolutely no money. They had no long-term plans. Really. They had very few, if any solid examples of

00:10:02.900 what a good, godly, committed marriage look like. Uh, my dad never had someone teach him what it was

00:10:09.100 like to lead a family in a Christlike way, or even in a practical way. And my mom didn't really have

00:10:14.640 that kind of example either. Um, but got married, they did. Uh, my mom continued to go to school 0.99

00:10:21.160 while working. My dad went to school at night and worked at an oil company during the day.

00:10:25.800 They had my oldest brother about a year and a half after they got married. Uh, my mom graduated from

00:10:31.680 college. The first person in her family to actually do that when she was 21, only three months after she

00:10:37.100 gave birth to my brother, it took my dad 10 years, 10 years of taking night classes and working full

00:10:44.800 time, uh, to finish college. But he did just before his 10 year high school reunion. Um, early in their

00:10:52.480 marriage, my parents lived in what they tell me was a cockroach infested trailer. My mom still to this

00:10:58.760 day has a fear of these cockroach type bugs called water bugs. She, if she's listening to this, she is

00:11:04.400 probably cringing, but that's what they had to do. They couldn't afford really anything else. Um, my mom

00:11:10.820 tells me about my dad's first boss, whom she hated at the time because he would make fun of my dad for

00:11:17.180 wearing the same suit to work every single day. Uh, one time my dad called my mom from work and told her

00:11:23.660 to go out and buy him new shoes because his boss told him he had to, she was panicked. She was

00:11:29.620 freaking out because she was like, Oh my gosh, where am I going to find the money to buy shoes? So she

00:11:34.460 literally scrounged up whatever change they had lying around and went to the discount store to buy my dad

00:11:41.280 new dress shoes. To make a long story shorter, both of my parents continued to work their butts off

00:11:50.640 because they were determined that they weren't going to stay in poverty right after they had my

00:11:56.600 other brother in 1985, still young and still poor. They moved to Dallas where my dad took a job at a

00:12:03.460 bank and it was that job that launched him into other career opportunities that after many years and

00:12:10.400 after many late nights and weekends working eventually led to him owning his own investment

00:12:15.820 firm really for as long as I can remember. So probably for the past like 21 years, my parents

00:12:22.000 have been entrepreneurs. I've only ever known my dad to be extremely hardworking, wise, and generous.

00:12:29.100 He has been very successful in all of his business and even political endeavors. My mom was able to stay

00:12:35.160 home with us, which I know is something not every child gets to benefit from growing up. And they were

00:12:40.100 able to provide for me and for my brothers, a life that was so vastly different from the lives

00:12:45.760 they had when they were growing up. We never had to worry about clothes or food or shoes. We never

00:12:52.000 had to worry about college. And it was, it wasn't just monetarily that my brothers and I were better

00:12:59.280 off than our parents. They also set a much better example for us than their parents probably did. They

00:13:05.200 raised us in church with good values. They've been married 38 years now. They just celebrated their

00:13:10.660 anniversary last month and they still love each other and even like each other. Both my parents

00:13:16.620 grew up in unsteady homes, but I never did. They made sure of that. It wasn't perfect growing up. I mean,

00:13:23.780 no home is perfect, but I never had to worry about whether or not I was going to be provided for or

00:13:30.380 cared for or loved. And I never wondered whether or not my parents loved each other and wanted to be

00:13:36.460 together. And because of that, because of all of that, I was able to go to college, the college that

00:13:42.720 I wanted to. Because of that, I was able to get a good job out of college. And because of both of

00:13:48.880 those things, I'm doing what I am doing now, which is what I've always wanted to do. I've always wanted

00:13:54.160 to write and speak. That's it. I've never wanted to do anything else. And because of my parents'

00:13:58.500 incredible hard work, I was placed in a position to be able to chase after that. And I did,

00:14:03.440 and I am. I'm doing it. I'm doing more now than I ever thought that I would be doing at 26.

00:14:09.100 A lot of that is, of course, because of my own hard work. Yes, but I'd be fooling myself if I

00:14:15.080 didn't acknowledge that my parents' sacrifices positioned me to get here. And here's the thing.

00:14:21.320 I'm not ashamed of that. When I talk about those things, it's not bragging. My parents worked really,

00:14:27.220 really hard to help me be in a position to do what I want to do. People who use the word privilege as

00:14:35.580 some kind of bad word want me to be ashamed of the fact that I use my parents' hard work as a

00:14:40.440 springboard for my life and my career. No, I'm not. I'm not ashamed of that. I'm proud.

00:14:45.940 You ask me if I'm privileged, and I say, yes, I am privileged. And my parents worked hard to make

00:14:51.440 sure I had privileges that they never did. They came from almost nothing, pulled themselves up by the

00:14:56.980 bootstraps at 19 with no help, no money, with all odds stacked against them, and they made it.

00:15:02.680 And by the time I was old enough to listen, they were able to look me in the eye and honestly say,

00:15:07.540 Allie, you can do anything you want to do in life. And because they are living proof, I believed them.

00:15:15.720 Yes, their lives are, of course, a testament to the grace of God, but they are also evidence of the

00:15:21.980 benefits of making good, even biblical choices. My parents made good choices when they were young

00:15:29.520 that distinguished them from their friends and their other family members that didn't. They got

00:15:35.040 married. Then they had kids. They lived within or below their means. They finished college despite

00:15:40.420 how long it took or how hard it was. My dad took jobs he knew would propel him forward and would

00:15:45.400 provide for a family. They both worked incredibly hard. They built a life for us that they never had.

00:15:52.120 Like I said, my grandma, growing up on a Louisiana cotton farm, was the first in her family to go to 0.98

00:15:58.000 and finish college. My mom was the first in her family to go to and finish college. My dad was the

00:16:04.860 first person in his family to make any money. They broke cycles in their families that could have just

00:16:12.180 as easily been perpetuated. I could have been the first in my family to finish high school and college.

00:16:17.320 I could be living in a trailer with my two kids, but I'm not. And most of it has to do with, yes,

00:16:24.000 number one, God's providence and also my parents' wise decisions in life.

00:16:30.240 And what makes me privileged isn't just that my parents worked hard for me, but that I live in a

00:16:36.160 country where this is not only possible, but it's actually the norm. That is why it is called the

00:16:41.760 American dream, not the Canadian dream, not the British dream, not the Chinese dream, the American

00:16:49.000 dream. America is the only place on earth where stories like my parents are typical, where people

00:16:57.280 are expected to and do rise up from poverty, from abuse, from destitution, from the worst adverse

00:17:04.160 circumstances possible and become something. And to have this typify what it is to be an American is

00:17:11.320 an incredible thing. No other country is defined that way. This kind of determination is literally

00:17:19.080 in the American DNA. Think about our founding and how we fought for independence from Britain.

00:17:25.520 We were tired of being taxed by an island miles away, so we freaking destroyed an entire shipment of

00:17:30.660 tea by throwing it into the ocean. We knew it was going to start a conflict with the British people 0.98

00:17:35.700 and we did it anyway. I mean, think about the Revolutionary War. It's all you need to look at

00:17:40.700 to see just how badass America is. We were fighting against Britain, a global superpower. We were a poor,

00:17:46.840 good for nothing, underfed, underarm group of men who had no business going up against the British.

00:17:54.360 We had no chance of winning, but we did. Why? Because we are awesome. Because

00:18:00.320 liberty means that much to us, George Washington did a surprise attack on Christmas crossing the

00:18:06.200 Delaware and defeated British troops. Totally relentless. And in case you didn't know, we won 1.00

00:18:12.400 the Revolutionary War, just in case you forgot about that, and we did gain our independence.

00:18:16.860 And speaking of the Revolutionary War, think about Alexander Hamilton, one of our founding fathers,

00:18:21.400 born in poverty in the Caribbean, orphaned at a young age, became a self-made genius by the time

00:18:26.220 he was 14. His community took up a collection just to send him to the States, where he became one of

00:18:31.640 the key players in the Revolution and in our founding. The right-hand man of George Washington

00:18:35.880 during the war, he also wrote the majority of the Federalist Papers that defended the Constitution.

00:18:41.500 His handiwork literally laid so much of the foundation of our country, and he came from

00:18:46.000 absolutely nothing. Our beginnings as an entire country are ragtag. The odds were stacked against us

00:18:52.680 so much for so long, but the American spirit has this unprecedented grit. And so far, we've proved

00:19:00.880 everyone wrong. That is the spark that is placed inside us as Americans, that there is nothing too

00:19:08.000 great or too far off for us to accomplish. I mean, we did win two world wars. We put a man on the moon.

00:19:15.260 We are the leaders in technology and innovation. Apple, Google, Facebook, Twitter,

00:19:19.440 these countries used by billions around the world were made on our soil. We are the capital of

00:19:24.740 creativity and entertainment. We are the mecca of TV, movies, music. There are some other really

00:19:31.180 great countries out there, but no country comes even close to having what we have. Hundreds of people,

00:19:39.580 if not thousands of people, risk their lives every day just to come here. America is the last and the 0.96

00:19:47.460 only shining beacon of freedom left in the world. We are the greatest last hope for liberty. We are

00:19:55.600 the only country willing to stand against tyranny. Despite all of our flaws, despite the horrors that

00:20:01.680 we've had in our past, horrors of slavery, Jim Crow, despite our history of inequality. Yes, I'm a

00:20:07.720 conservative and I said that. Despite our imperfections, the American experiment is the

00:20:12.760 greatest and most successful experiment this world has ever seen. But all of these things have become

00:20:20.160 dramatically less true in the last 10 years. People don't believe these things anymore.

00:20:26.060 They want to make us more like Canada, more like Europe. They think socialism is the way.

00:20:31.680 More gun control, single payer health care, free college. They would rather exchange freedom for

00:20:37.040 comfort like every other country in the world has always done. They want to even the global playing

00:20:43.340 field. They think it's mean and wrong to say that America is the best. It's all of a sudden just a

00:20:48.800 conservative thing to be patriotic. It's not an American thing. It's a conservative thing. The cool

00:20:55.480 liberal thing to do is to, sorry, but shit on our country. And I will tell you why. Okay, so what I'm

00:21:05.380 about to say, I don't say as a Republican, honestly and truly, I say it as an American. But hear me,

00:21:14.960 Barack Obama had a lot of good qualities. From what I could tell, he was a good father. He was a good

00:21:20.180 husband. He was eloquent. He seemed down to earth, probably really nice, probably fun to talk to. He

00:21:25.140 seems like someone you just want to grab a beer with. Fine. But the reality is he did serious damage

00:21:30.640 to our country. He was the first president to make being unpatriotic cool. He apologized to countries

00:21:39.740 constantly for our strength. He worked to even the global playing field rather than have America lead.

00:21:45.580 He exacerbated racial tension. He focused on America's flaws and perceived oppression rather

00:21:50.940 than our inherent goodness. He popularized social justice, warriorism, and words that we hear today

00:21:57.440 constantly, like bigotry, sexism, misogyny, yada, yada, yada. He was an ideologue who made it his goal

00:22:04.300 to show America how bad it was and attempt to change America to look more like the rest of the world. 0.98

00:22:12.340 There's this really interesting statistic by Pew that I think shows just how much Obama changed

00:22:19.800 people's perspectives on America. The overall study shows just how far left liberals have gone since

00:22:26.600 1990, while conservatives have stayed about the same. But this particular stat in the study I found

00:22:31.360 so interesting. Democrats and Republicans had to say if they agreed or disagreed with the following

00:22:38.480 statement, and that is racial discrimination is the main reason black people cannot get ahead these

00:22:45.540 days. The commentary says that this means that racial discrimination rather than individual choices

00:22:51.960 is the thing holding black people back. In 1990, 39% of Democrats agreed with that statement as opposed to 26%

00:23:02.080 of Republicans. 39%. So a minority. Today, today, the number of Democrats who believe that racial

00:23:11.020 discrimination rather than personal choices is holding black people back in America is 68%. An all-time high.

00:23:18.460 29 percentage points, that number has gone up. And if you look at the graph, it's really so

00:23:27.520 interesting. That percentage hit an all-time low in 2010 at 28%. So lower than 1990, 28% of Democrats

00:23:35.920 believe that it was racial discrimination rather than personal choices that were holding black people

00:23:39.760 back in America. 2010, 28%, the year Obama took office, lowest it's been in 30 years. That means

00:23:46.420 from 2010 to 2017, the year Obama was in office. Democrats went from 28% thinking racism was the main thing

00:23:55.720 holding people back, black people back, to 68% believing that. Highest number we've seen. That number jumped 1.00

00:24:03.140 40 percentage points when Obama, our first black president, was in office. Now, is it even remotely

00:24:10.760 logical or possible that during the eight years Obama was in office or in the past 28 years since 1990 that

00:24:18.320 America has actually become more racist? That racism is actually holding black people back more than it

00:24:25.560 used to? No, of course not. Absolutely not. That's just not reality. But it doesn't matter because the

00:24:33.320 perception has changed. And as we know, perception is reality. That is what Obama did, both in his

00:24:40.860 apologetic foreign policy and in his divisive race-baiting domestic policy. He instilled in

00:24:47.240 Americans what really no president that I know of before has done, and that is the idea that America 0.55

00:24:54.000 is bad and that we still need to pay for our sins. So you can imagine why when we have a presidential

00:25:00.140 candidate come along with a slogan that's literally a direct slap in the face to everything Obama tried

00:25:05.640 to do in his presidency, make America great again, people are going to be really upset.

00:25:10.980 The idea of American greatness is offensive to people who have been conditioned for the past

00:25:16.300 eight years to believe that America is bad. I mean, we probably talk more about colonialism,

00:25:23.620 our mistreatment of Native American slavery in the Civil War than we ever have before. People are

00:25:28.440 all of a sudden upset about Confederate statues. People all of a sudden care about the so-called

00:25:34.760 racism of the Star-Spangled Banner. Why? Because we're more racist than we've ever been before? No,

00:25:41.660 because Obama validated that attitude that we need to rehash all of our old sins and pay penance for them

00:25:48.520 still. He fundamentally changed how people view America. It used to be that the people who disagree

00:25:55.720 politically did so because they both cared about and loved the country. It is now a battle between

00:26:01.460 those who love America and those who in general, not everyone, but those who in general don't.

00:26:08.720 They don't agree anymore in what America fundamentally is. They don't like the Constitution.

00:26:13.920 They think the founding fathers were a bunch of bigots. They think America is inherently flawed.

00:26:19.140 Whereas the other side, I'm included in this, believe that, yes, of course, America has flaws.

00:26:24.100 We've made mistakes. We have stumbled, but we are foundationally good. That the idea,

00:26:30.160 the American idea, is the best idea any created human has ever had. And because of that, we are

00:26:37.320 still the best country in the world. And the closer we stay to what this country was intended to be,

00:26:43.760 a beacon of liberty and free enterprise, the better off we'll be. I mean, even Martin Luther King Jr.,

00:26:50.520 a true and good and actual and productive social justice warrior, not the superficial kind we have

00:26:56.260 today, believed that what the founders set up was good. Even though Americans strayed from it and the

00:27:02.540 founders themselves didn't act it out very well, that all are created equal and are endowed by their

00:27:08.980 creator with certain unalienable rights, among them being life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

00:27:14.000 That and scripture were his constant foundation in all of his rhetoric and his push for civil rights.

00:27:20.820 But today, the people who claim to care about social justice and civil rights don't refer to

00:27:25.700 the constitution of what our founders set up. They actually don't believe in unalienable rights at

00:27:31.240 all, because if they did, they would have to admit that the government, an institution made by man,

00:27:35.980 can't take away rights that are unalienable. Unalienable. I have a really hard time saying that word.

00:27:42.000 Sorry. They would have to acknowledge that our rights are inherent and God-given,

00:27:47.960 which completely messes up their ideology, which says that the government should be able to give

00:27:53.120 and take away rights as they see fit. They don't believe in rights and inequality outlined in the

00:27:58.900 constitution and is constantly referenced by MLK Jr. They believe in government-mandated moral

00:28:04.300 relativism. They want the government to drive forth their progressive Marxist ideology,

00:28:09.780 no questions asked. They want open-bordered socialism and nothing less, which couldn't

00:28:15.460 be any further from what America was set up to be. It's no longer Republican versus Democrat.

00:28:22.400 It is those who love America and those who don't. In no other country is my grandmother's and parent's

00:28:30.180 story possible. In no other country can a poor mom or dad look at their kid and say with absolute

00:28:36.900 certainty, you can do anything you want to do. No other country values merit and strength and

00:28:43.340 determination and bravery the way ours has. No other country was set up to give its government

00:28:48.660 less power than the people they govern. Did you hear that? America is the only country in the world

00:28:54.900 designed to empower its people. We have the Second Amendment literally to defend ourselves

00:29:00.980 against a tyrannical government. That's amazing. Every other government is set up to keep the people

00:29:06.400 in line, to rein in the government. Our government isn't. And for Christians specifically, who seem to 1.00

00:29:13.520 think that being patriotic is a bad thing, how do you think religious liberty goes in a socialistic

00:29:18.860 country? You think Christians in socialist China are thriving? North Korea, the Middle East, you think 0.89

00:29:23.700 they're doing well there? Even in the UK and other parts of Europe, does the church seem thriving there

00:29:28.960 to you? No, because it's not. You go to those countries, the church is literally mostly dead. I would know

00:29:35.420 I have been there. In countries where the government is the caretaker, godlessness always ensues. More

00:29:42.320 government always, always, always, always, always, always leads to godlessness. You think we're going to be

00:29:50.660 seeing pro-life policies in a socialistic America? You think we're going to value the unborn, the sick, 0.99

00:29:57.560 the disabled? No. Think about Charlie Gard. Think about the epidemic of assisted suicide throughout

00:30:02.800 Europe. Now, listen, I do think it's important that we don't raise our patriotism to the same level

00:30:09.880 as our allegiance to God's kingdom. Absolutely not. All earthly allegiances are secondary to our

00:30:15.020 citizenship in heaven. How we treat others and how we conduct our lives should be subject first and

00:30:19.980 foremost to God. He is our purpose and our ultimate hope. The gospel is the banner we wave far

00:30:26.760 above the American flag. I do think it's important to say that God is not an American and that even 0.99

00:30:34.620 though, yes, I believe he ordained America to be special, we are not exempt from his wrath. At the end

00:30:41.180 of it all, every knee will bow, every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, and there will be a new

00:30:46.400 heaven and new earth and America and all other countries will be obsolete. Okay? So I just needed

00:30:52.180 to say that because I could feel some of you getting a little bit antsy there, so I just needed to put

00:30:56.500 that out there. But we as Christians also have an earthly and moral obligation to push for good policies

00:31:04.460 in a form of government in which people can best succeed. And as much as people want to tell you that

00:31:09.780 Jesus himself was a socialist, socialism ain't gonna cut it. And that's really our only other option

00:31:14.760 besides what we have. You think a healthy government is one where they force you to give all of your work,

00:31:19.820 energy, and money to them? Socialism has claimed the lives of over 100 million people throughout

00:31:25.160 history. You think that's a good thing? You think God rejoices in that? Hitler was a socialist. Nazi 0.87

00:31:30.560 stands for national socialist. You think that worked out well? That maybe we should try it here? You think

00:31:35.560 that's a biblical thing to do? Now, I'm not saying that God's a capitalist. I'm not saying that capitalism

00:31:40.560 is perfect, but it's lifted a heck of a lot more people out of poverty than socialism has. It's

00:31:47.100 encouraged a lot more charity and generosity than communism has. It's allowed for human flourishing

00:31:52.540 more than any other economic system. There is a reason we are the most successful nation in history,

00:31:59.940 and it is not because of socialism. And so many people take that for granted. I hate to say this

00:32:06.500 because I know it's rude, but please, if you don't like our country, go somewhere else and see how it

00:32:12.860 works out for you. I mean, I would love for you to move to another country and try out their

00:32:17.080 governments. You might honestly like it better. I don't know. You might. I'm not trying to be mean.

00:32:22.500 You might actually like Europe better than America, and if so, so be it. But don't take away other

00:32:27.900 people's shot at the American dream by making America more like Europe. Every time we grow the 0.96

00:32:34.000 government, increase taxes, chip away at our sovereignty by allowing undeterred illegal immigration, 0.97

00:32:39.360 advocate for socialism, we get closer and closer to an America in which stories like my parents just

00:32:45.080 can't happen. And not just theirs, but countless others, Oprah, Steve Jobs, Ben Carson, Frederick

00:32:50.320 Douglas, the thousands of others who came from nothing and then became something and changed history.

00:32:57.900 Yes, as Americans, we are privileged. White, black, man, woman, gay, straight, trans, Christian,

00:33:04.680 Muslim, whatever you are, we are privileged. We are the most privileged people in the entire world.

00:33:10.380 And rather than be ashamed of that, we need to use it for good to perpetuate liberty to the next

00:33:15.700 generation. We are the last hope of freedom. We are the last final refuge for those fleeing tyranny.

00:33:22.880 It would be immoral. It would be a sin to take that for granted. We should be on our knees thanking

00:33:30.640 God every day for the gift of common grace of living in the United States of America.

00:33:36.500 What an incredible blessing that so many have died to obtain and others have fought,

00:33:42.060 bled, and died to defend. It is our responsibility to hold on to America as long as we can.

00:33:48.840 We hear the really popular quote by Ronald Reagan a lot, but it's hardly ever read in context.

00:33:57.420 So this is the quote that was spoken at his gubernatorial inaugural address in 1967.

00:34:02.980 Freedom is a fragile thing and is never more than one generation away from extinction.

00:34:08.680 It is not ours by inheritance. It must be fought for and defended constantly by each generation,

00:34:15.120 for it comes only once to a people. Those who have known freedom and then lost it have never known

00:34:22.120 it again. Knowing this, it is hard to explain those who even today would question the people's

00:34:27.920 capacity for self-rule. Will they answer this? If no one among us is capable of governing himself,

00:34:34.840 then who among us has the capacity to govern someone else? Using the temporary authority granted

00:34:41.040 by the people, an increasing number lately have sought to control the means of production as if

00:34:46.020 this could be done without eventually controlling those who produce. Always this is explained as

00:34:52.080 necessary to the people's welfare. But the deterioration of every government begins with

00:34:58.460 the decay of the principle upon which it was founded. This is true today as it was when it was

00:35:04.320 written in 1748. And then there's the story of Benjamin Franklin who was asked by a woman when

00:35:10.920 he was leaving the Constitutional Convention what kind of government they decided upon and he said to

00:35:16.180 her, a republic, ma'am, if you can keep it. So the principle of these two quotes is liberty is always

00:35:24.140 conditional to our willingness to defend it. So that's it. I mean, I get really pumped up about this.

00:35:31.620 I just, I don't know. I just really hate when people and especially wimpy Christians talk about 1.00

00:35:36.580 how bad this country is. Like if you think it's so bad, either leave or make it better. It's that

00:35:41.840 simple. And the way to make it better is by promoting more freedom, not less. Okay. So are we

00:35:49.360 done with that? Yes, I think we are. So at the end of the podcast, we've been doing random segments.

00:35:54.360 Um, last week I did, I think confessions and I talked about how I'm guilty of unbiblical sass, 1.00

00:36:02.820 which I am. And I talked about unbiblical versus biblical sass. And before that, I think I did

00:36:07.720 things I just don't get. And I talked about lifestyle bloggers and how I just could never be

00:36:13.020 one. And today is cat facts. I'm just going to make these up every time. Cat facts. So as y'all know,

00:36:20.960 I have two cats, Rachel McAdams and Sweatpants, and they're just two stupidly awesome cats that I

00:36:27.440 love so much. Uh, today's cat fact is the very empirical and well-studied and documented fact

00:36:36.160 that cats would kill you if they were just big enough. So dogs don't kill you because they're

00:36:42.780 good doggos. They love you. They're good boys and good girls. Cats are not. They feel no

00:36:50.940 such affection. They're not good. They tolerate you because you feed them. They even will allow

00:36:57.440 you to be their napping place every now and then if you are lucky. But if you even think about

00:37:02.760 touching them one too many times, they will attack you. Cats have no moral compass, no guilt. They have

00:37:08.900 no remorse whatsoever. If you have ever seen that look that a cat gets right before it's about to

00:37:14.320 attack your face, like they get really still, they pin their ears back and they narrow their eyes.

00:37:19.040 And then all of a sudden it's like their full body weight is on your face. They don't know they're

00:37:23.480 not about to kill you. They're like perfectly fine with whatever the outcome is of this attack. Like

00:37:29.800 if they slice your jugular, fine. If they gouge your eyes out, so be it. The only reason you are not

00:37:36.560 dead is because your cat is not big enough to kill you. Not because she loves you. So that is my cat

00:37:43.440 fact for today. It is very well studied. Like I said, I have two cats and a dog. I've been studying

00:37:49.800 their behavior and that is a fact that your cat actually wants to kill you. So just watch out for

00:37:56.280 that. Okay, that's it. I hope that you enjoyed this. Please follow me on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook

00:38:01.140 and at CRTV.com slash Allie. Bye.

Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - April 04, 2018

Ep 4 ｜ The Christian Case for American Patriotism (+ Cat Facts)

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