Washington, D.C.: The United States of America continues to inspire awe as a marvelous, virtually unique political construction, but the recent US Supreme Court ruling on same-sex “marriage” and the latest research studies showing a marked decline in belief in God, particularly among young Americans, provoke certain questions about the future of this great nation and others which try to imitate it, wisely or unwisely, as a role model.

Built under a “sacred canopy,” as some of its more perceptive writers put it, America’s roots extend all the way down to the rock of Abraham and the richest Biblical tradition; its coinage proudly proclaims its view of the world in unabashedly religious terms: “In God We Trust.” At the very outset, its founding was hailed as “nothing less than a miracle” by men of outstanding values and capabilities in search of the unfettered freedom to worship God according to their conscience.