 Ladies and gentlemen, the President of the United States and Mrs. Reagan and the Vice President of the United States and Mrs. Bush of the City of Dallas, the Honorable Abe Stark Taylor, Jr. Mr. President, Mr. Vice President, Nancy, Barbara, Mary Evans, distinguished guest, ladies and gentlemen, on behalf of the City of Dallas, it is my pleasure to be living in a city like Dallas and in a country like the United States of America. Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall inherit the earth. Grant us the courage to preserve freedom, the patience to pursue peace, and the wisdom to seek both. Give us vigor to compete, compassion to help, and love for the common humanity of all. Give us encouragement, hope and humor, and when we fall short, the humility to know that our strength to survive both triumph and disaster comes from you. O Lord, give us peace, lasting, durable peace. We ask this in thy name. Amen. This is truly a great day in Dallas. We are so appreciative of this choir and orchestra and the time and hard work which have gone into making this program a success. We're so blessed as a city, as a people, and certainly as a nation. And I count as one of my blessings, the man that I am privileged to introduce. What more could be said of any man than he has renewed the spirit of freedom-loving people all over this globe. Has shown strength in adversity, compassion in victory, and faith in God and the people of our nation. He has restored pride in America, but he has also restored pride in Americans. He certainly needs no introduction because he's the president of our country. He has, however, established the needed sense of oneness in our nation again. He stands for those values which all Americans hold dear. He keeps his promises. He keeps counsel with integrity. And he has kept the faith with the people of this nation. Ladies and gentlemen, the president of the United States. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you, ladies and gentlemen, very much. And Martha Weisner, thank you very much. And I could say that if the morning ended with the music we have just heard from that magnificent choir, it would indeed be a holy day for all of us. It's wonderful to be here this morning. The past few days have been pretty busy for all of us, but I've wanted to be with you today to share some of my own thoughts. These past few weeks, it seems that we've all been hearing a lot of talk about religion and its role in politics, religion and its place in the political life of the nation. And I think it's appropriate today that a prayer breakfast for 17,000 citizens in the state of Texas during a great political convention that this issue be addressed. I don't speak as a theologian or a scholar. Only as one who's lived a little more than his three score ten, which has been a source of annoyance to some. There's one who has been active in the political life of the nation for roughly four decades and now has served the past three and a half years in our highest office. I speak, I think, I can say as one who has seen much, who has loved his country and who's seen a change in many ways. I believe that faith and religion play a critical role in the political life of our nation and always have. And that the church, and by that I mean all churches, all denominations, has had a strong influence on the state and this has worked to our benefit as a nation. Those who created our country and the founding fathers and mothers understood that there is a divine order which transcends the human order. They saw the state in fact as a form of moral order and felt that the bedrock of moral order is religion. The Mayflower Compact began with the words in the name of God, amen. The Declaration of Independence appeals to nature's God and the Creator and the supreme judge of the world. Congress was given a chaplain and the oaths of office are oaths before God. James Madison in the Federalist Papers admitted that in the creation of our republic he perceived the hand of the Almighty. John Jay, the first Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, warned that we must never forget the God from whom our blessings flow. George Washington referred to religions profound and unsurpassed place in the heart of our nation quite directly in his farewell address in 1796. Seven years earlier, France had erected a government that was intended to be purely secular. This new government would be grounded on reason rather than the law of God. By 1796, the French Revolution had known the reign of terror. And Washington voiced reservations about the idea that there could be a wise policy without a firm moral and religious foundation. He said, Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports. In vain would that man call himself a patriot who would labor to subvert these finest props of the duties of men and citizens. The mere politician and the pious man ought to respect and to cherish religion and morality. And he added, Let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion. I believe that George Washington knew the city of man cannot survive without the city of God. That the visible city will perish without the invisible city. Religion played not only a strong role in our national life, it played a positive role. The abolitionist movement was at heart a moral and religious movement. So was the modern civil rights struggle. And throughout this time, the state was tolerant of religious belief, expression and practice. Society too was tolerant. But in the 1960s, this began to change. We began to make great steps toward secularizing our nation and removing religion from its honored place. In 1962, the Supreme Court in the New York prayer case banned the compulsory saying of prayers. In 1963, the court banned the reading of the Bible in our public schools. From that point on, the courts pushed the meaning of the ruling ever outward so that now our children are not allowed voluntary prayer. He even had to pass a law. We passed a special law in the Congress just a few weeks ago to allow student prayer groups the same access to school rooms after classes that a young Marxist society, for example, would already enjoy with no opposition. The 1962 decision opened the way to a flood of similar suits. Once religion had been made vulnerable, a series of assaults were made in one court after another on one issue after another. Cases were started to argue against tax-exempt status for churches. Suits were brought to abolish the words under God from the Pledge of Allegiance and to remove in God we trust from public documents and from our currency. Today, there are those who are fighting to make sure voluntary prayer is not returned to the classrooms. And the frustrating thing for the great majority of Americans who support and understand the special importance of religion in the national life, the frustrating thing is that those who are attacking religion claim they are doing it in the name of tolerance, freedom, and open-mindedness. Question, isn't the real truth that they are intolerant of religion? They refuse to tolerate its importance in our lives. If all the children of our country studied together, all of the many religions in our country, wouldn't they learn greater tolerance of each other's beliefs? If children prayed together, would they not understand what they have in common and would this not indeed bring them closer and is this not to be desired? So I submit to you that those who claim to be fighting for tolerance on this issue may not be tolerant at all. When John Kennedy was running for president in 1960, he said that his church would not dictate his presidency any more than he would speak for his church, just so and proper. But John Kennedy was speaking in an America in which the role of religion, and by that I mean the role of all churches, was secure. Abortion was not a political issue. Prayer was not a political issue. The right of church schools to operate was not a political issue. And it was broadly acknowledged that religious leaders had a right and a duty to speak out on the issues of the day. They held a place of respect, and a politician who spoke to or of them with a lack of respect would not long survive in the political arena. It was acknowledged then that religion held a special place occupied a special territory in the hearts of the citizenry. The climate has changed greatly since then, and since it has, it logically follows that religion needs defenders against those who care only for the interests of the state. There are these days many questions on which religious leaders are obliged to offer their moral and theological guidance, and such guidance is a good and necessary thing. To know how a church and its members feel on a public issue expands the parameters of debate. It does not narrow the debate. It expands it. The truth is, politics and morality are inseparable. And as morality's foundation is religion, religion and politics are necessarily related. We need religion as a guide. We need it because we are imperfect. And our government needs the church because only those humble enough to admit their sinners can bring to democracy the tolerance it requires in order to survive. A state is nothing more than a reflection of its citizens. The more decent the citizens, the more decent the state. If you practice a religion, whether you're Catholic, Protestant, Jewish, or guided by some other faith, then your private life will be influenced by a sense of moral obligation. And so too will your public life. One affects the other. The churches of America do not exist by the grace of the state. The churches of America are not mere citizens of the state. The churches of America exist apart. They have their own vantage point, their own authority. Religion is its own realm. It makes its own claims. We establish no religion in this country, nor will we ever. We command no worship. We mandate no belief. But we poison our society when we remove its theological underpinnings. We court corruption when we leave it bereft of belief. All are free to believe or not to believe. All are free to practice a faith or not. But those who believe must be free to speak of and act on their belief to apply moral teaching to public questions. I submit to you that the Tolerance Society is open to and encouraging of all religions. And this does not weaken us. It strengthens us. It makes us strong. You know, if we look back through history to all those great civilizations, those great nations that rose up to even world dominance and then deteriorated, declined and fell, we find they all had one thing in common. One of the significant forerunners of their fall was their turning away from their God or gods. Without God there is no virtue because there is no prompting of the conscience. Without God we are mired in the material, that flat world that tells us only what the senses perceive. Without God there is a coarsening of the society. And without God democracy will not and cannot long endure. If we ever forget that we're one nation under God, then we will be a nation gone under. If I could just make a personal statement of my own, in these three and a half years, I have understood and known better than ever before the words of Lincoln when he said that he would be the greatest fool on this footstool called Earth if he ever thought that for one moment he could perform the duties of that office without help from one who is stronger than all. I thank you. Thank you for inviting us here today. Thank you for your kindness and your patience. May God keep you and we may we, all of us, keep God. Thank you. Directed by Mr. Gary Moore. President and Mrs. Reagan. Vice President and Mrs. George Bush. This morning you've honored God and you've honored us by being here today. Our prayers go with you now for continued good health, strength, vitality, wisdom, and divine direction to lead this great country. Mr. President, we are so proud of what you've done over the past three and a half years. Since it is necessary that the President and the Vice President must leave your momentarily because of other engagements, I want to excuse them, but I want to excuse them with the belief that all of us here, sir, that we have great love, respect, and admiration for you. And now we want you to go back and to spend this day preparing for that acceptance speech tonight. Mr. President.