I agree with you. Lincoln was constantly looking for a "sign" so to say unlike Bush who does believe he has God's best interests at heart.

There is a big difference between someone who desires to do God's will and someone who does his own will and calls it God's.

I find it ironic that the father of the Republican party's own example of keeping his personal religious views apart from his politics is ignored in todays modern Republican Party.

We could get into a debate over Lincoln and Davis trying to outdo each other with National Day Of Prayer decrees but we all know that was politics in action.

I'll remember to site you in my bibliography next time I write a term paper on Lincoln.

The larger point is that W thinks he is on God's side and Lincoln was not sure.

When you believe you are doing god's will, a certain arrogance takes hold as can be seen with the invasion, spying, and torture.

""Mr. Lincoln had no hope, and no faith, in the usual acceptation of those words...Mr. Lincoln's maxim and philosophy were: 'What is to be, will be, and no prayers of ours can arrest the decree.' He never joined any Church. He was a religious man always, I think, but was not a technical Christian." Mary Todd Lincoln

Robert, I'm begining to think this another one of those conversations similiar to the one where you tried to claim Hitler was not a devout Christian. How did that turn out? Do you remember?

Don't mistake Lincoln's disdain for church and politics with his own personal views. In his own personal writings Lincoln very much felt that he was appointed by God to the oval office and he was to lead America through the trial by fire.

Some historians feel that Lincoln's guilt for allowing the Civil War to happen caused his hyper-spirituality towards the end of the war. Other historians believe the influence of his close friend and Presbyterian minister Dr. Phineas Gurley along with the death of his 11 year old son caused a religious revival in Lincoln. I guess to some extent we'll never know.

My point is that both Bush and Lincoln are similar in that they believe that God put them in the Oval Office for a divine purpose. Where Bush and Lincoln part ways is Lincoln downplayed his spirituality and kept it from interfering with public policy. Bush openly professes his spirituality and proposes ammendments to the constitution to back it up.

A good article of interest on Lincoln's spiritual transformation in the White House is Nicholas Parrilo's "Lincoln's Calvinist Transformation". It can be found on the Journal Of American History website. Or read "Lincoln in American Memory" by Merrill D. Peterson.

Good stuff. I find Lincoln fascinating!!!

From Lincoln's second inaugural:

"Both read the same Bible, and pray to the same God; and each invokes His aid against the other. It may seem strange that any men should dare to ask a just God's assistance in wringing their bread from the sweat of other men's faces; but let us judge not that we be not judged. The prayers of both could not be answered; that of neither has been answered fully. The Almighty has his own purposes."

Bush and Lincoln both believed God put them in the Oval Office.

For those interested on this subject research the American Social Gospel.

Keep your fantasies to yourselves while keeping the bars open on Sunday.

Doug, Mike's contempt for religion is no different than your contempt for liberals and big gummit. We all have things we don't like about society. Conservatives though feel it is their right and their duty to rail about anything and everything but then get offended when the tables are turned.

The man is an idiot and deserves nothing more than the scorn of thinking South Carolinians.

All ten of us.

It all comes together.