Thank you. Thank you very much. Please be seated.

Thank you so much. Heads of state, Cabinet members, my outstanding Vice President, members of Congress, religious leaders, distinguished guests, Admiral Mullen -- it's good to see all of you. Let me begin by acknowledging the co-chairs of this breakfast, Senators Isakson and Klobuchar, who embody the sense of fellowship at the heart of this gathering. They're two of my favorite senators. Let me also acknowledge the director of my faith-based office, Joshua DuBois, who is here. Where's Joshua? He's out there somewhere. He's doing great work.

I want to commend Secretary Hillary Clinton on her outstanding remarks, and her outstanding leadership at the State Department. She's doing good every day. I'm especially pleased to see my dear friend, Prime Minister Zapatero, and I want him to relay America's greetings to the people of Spain. And Johnny, you are right, I'm deeply blessed, and I thank God every day for being married to Michelle Obama.

Last month, God's grace, God's mercy, seemed far away from our neighbors in Haiti. And yet I believe that grace was not absent in the midst of tragedy. It was heard in prayers and hymns that broke the silence of an earthquake's wake. It was witnessed among parishioners of churches that stood no more, a roadside congregation, holding bibles in their laps. It was felt in the presence of relief workers and medics; translators; servicemen and women, bringing water and food and aid to the injured.

One such translator was an American of Haitian descent, representative of the extraordinary work that our men and women in uniform do all around the world -- Navy Corpsman Christian [sic] Brossard. And lying on a gurney aboard the USNS Comfort, a woman asked Christopher: "Where do you come from? What country? After my operation," she said, "I will pray for that country." And in Creole, Corpsman Brossard responded, "Etazini." The United States of America.

Life’s most “sacred responsibility” is to love the one true and living God and do his will by believing on His Only Son. Then out of love for God, to do his will for God’s greater glory. This translates into help for others as an expression of worship unto God. Good works are fine as far as they go, but a truly good work must first be motivated by a love for God.

Sadly, though, that spirit is too often absent when tackling the long-term, but no less profound issues facing our country and the world. Too often, that spirit is missing without the spectacular tragedy, the 9/11 or the Katrina, the earthquake or the tsunami, that can shake us out of complacency. We become numb to the day-to-day crises, the slow-moving tragedies of children without food and men without shelter and families without health care. We become absorbed with our abstract arguments, our ideological disputes, our contests for power. And in this Tower of Babel, we lose the sound of God's voice.

Obama rightly includes himself in his indictment. He is the most ideological of the bunch. Concern for children, healthcare etc. is first and foremost a family matter. The war on poverty has bankrupted America because the solution is not more government. 

Now, for those of us here in Washington, let's acknowledge that democracy has always been messy. Let's not be overly nostalgic. Divisions are hardly new in this country. Arguments about the proper role of government, the relationship between liberty and equality, our obligations to our fellow citizens -- these things have been with us since our founding. And I'm profoundly mindful that a loyal opposition, a vigorous back and forth, a skepticism of power, all of that is what makes our democracy work.

The Founders gave us constitutional limits on the role of government and did not promise absolute equality in outcomes. Our obligations to our fellow citizens are based on our individual duties to God, and therefore not the governments concern.

And we've seen actually some improvement in some circumstances. We haven't seen any canings on the floor of the Senate any time recently. So we shouldn't over-romanticize the past. But there is a sense that something is different now; that something is broken; that those of us in Washington are not serving the people as well as we should. At times, it seems like we're unable to listen to one another; to have at once a serious and civil debate. And this erosion of civility in the public square sows division and distrust among our citizens. It poisons the well of public opinion. It leaves each side little room to negotiate with the other. It makes politics an all-or-nothing sport, where one side is either always right or always wrong when, in reality, neither side has a monopoly on truth. And then we lose sight of the children without food and the men without shelter and the families without health care.

This is progressive double speak. It is President Obama’s tactics of shutting out debate and compromise that has doomed his own agenda. He is unable to listen to anything that does not fit his socialist schemes. Ironically, Obama says no one has a monopoly on truth, but as a Unitarian he does not believe in truth. Just because people object to his radical socialist proposals he assumes they don’t care about the children or families and health care.

Empowered by faith, consistently, prayerfully, we need to find our way back to civility. That begins with stepping out of our comfort zones in an effort to bridge divisions. We see that in many conservative pastors who are helping lead the way to fix our broken immigration system. It's not what would be expected from them, and yet they recognize, in those immigrant families, the face of God.

So Obama is surprised to find that conservative pastors aren’t absolutely heartless. Well that’s refreshing. He laments the polarity between people and yet he is incredibly bigoted and biased. A conservative can do what liberals can’t. They can distinguish between helping someone truly in need and still uphold our laws. If someone breaks into my house just because he wants to live in a nicer home, am I obligated to let him stay? True refugees who flee from religious and political oppression have always been allowed refuge in the US. Why are we obligated to open our nation to people who just want a higher standard of living? If it is a true moral obligation then we owe it to the entire world’s population, not just those who have easy access to our borders. The fact is our immigration laws are compassionate and just, but Obama wants to grant amnesty so he can keep progressives in power.  

We see that in the evangelical leaders who are rallying their congregations to protect our planet.

But evangelicals don’t see man as the problem with the planet and reject the socialistic environmentalists who simply want to use ecology as a means to destroy capitalism. Stewardship of and dominion over creation is God’s mandate.  

We see it in the increasing recognition among progressives that government can't solve all of our problems, and that talking about values like responsible fatherhood and healthy marriage are integral to any anti-poverty agenda.

Finally a realistic view of government and a proper appreciation of God’s first institution.

But apparently Obama can call into question the motives of conservatives who simply want to see a birth certificate and maybe some outward attendance at church.

 

Challenging each other's ideas can renew our democracy. But when we challenge each other's motives, it becomes harder to see what we hold in common. We forget that we share at some deep level the same dreams -- even when we don't share the same plans on how to fulfill them.

Obama dreams the progressive dream of big government and socialism. Americans dream of being left alone by the government to practice their religion, raise their family, keep the fruit of their labors and help their neighbors.

 

We may disagree about the best way to reform our health care system, but surely we can agree that no one ought to go broke when they get sick in the richest nation on Earth.

It is not the government’s job to force people to pay for other people’s healthcare. Buying insurance is a choice free people can make.  

We can take different approaches to ending inequality, but surely we can agree on the need to lift our children out of ignorance;

Education is not the government’s duty. Families are to provide for their children’s education, and if they can’t afford it, churches and philanthropy can provide as it did before government education destroyed our literacy rates. 

to lift our neighbors from poverty.

Government can’t fix poverty because most poverty is the result of irresponsible personal decisions.     

We may disagree about gay marriage, but surely we can agree that it is unconscionable to target gays and lesbians for who they are -- whether it's here in the United States or, as Hillary mentioned, more extremely in odious laws that are being proposed most recently in Uganda.

Surely we can agree to find common ground when possible, parting ways when necessary. But in doing so, let us be guided by our faith, and by prayer. For while prayer can buck us up when we are down, keep us calm in a storm; while prayer can stiffen our spines to surmount an obstacle -- and I assure you I'm praying a lot these days -- prayer can also do something else. It can touch our hearts with humility. It can fill us with a spirit of brotherhood. It can remind us that each of us are children of a awesome and loving God.

We are all creations of an awesome and Holy God who loves in his Son Jesus Christ in spite of our enmity with him. Judgment awaits all who refuse to trust on the Lord Jesus Christ the only Savior of the world. Our prayers become sin if they are offered in our own name. Only prayer in and through the merits of Jesus Christ are acceptable before a righteous God.

Through faith, but not through faith alone, we can unite people to serve the common good. And that's why my Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships has been working so hard since I announced it here last year.

Harry Knox, an anti-Christian homosexual uses his office to attack Christian virtues and the Pope because they will not allow for promiscuous sex with condoms as a way to combat HIV in Africa. 

We've slashed red tape and built effective partnerships on a range of uses, from promoting fatherhood here at home to spearheading interfaith cooperation abroad. And through that office we've turned the faith-based initiative around to find common ground among people of all beliefs, allowing them to make an impact in a way that's civil and respectful of difference and focused on what matters most.

Love the focus on responsible, fatherhood.  This is the crying need of our nation that God will turn the hearts of the fathers to their children. But government can’t change a person’s heart.

It is this spirit of civility that we are called to take up when we leave here today.

But he just took a swipe at the Bush administration?

That's what I'm praying for. I know in difficult times like these -- when people are frustrated, when pundits start shouting and politicians start calling each other names -- it can seem like a return to civility is not possible, like the very idea is a relic of some bygone era. The word itself seems quaint -- civility.

But let us remember those who came before; those who believed in the brotherhood of man even when such a faith was tested. Remember Dr. Martin Luther King. Not long after an explosion ripped through his front porch, his wife and infant daughter inside, he rose to that pulpit in Montgomery and said, "Love is the only force capable of transforming an enemy into a friend."

In the eyes of those who denied his humanity, he saw the face of God.

Remember Abraham Lincoln. On the eve of the Civil War, with states seceding and forces gathering, with a nation divided half slave and half free, he rose to deliver his first Inaugural and said, "We are not enemies, but friends... Though passion may have strained, it must not break our bonds of affection."

Even in the eyes of confederate soldiers, he saw the face of God.

Remember William Wilberforce, whose Christian faith led him to seek slavery's abolition in Britain; he was vilified, derided, attacked; but he called for "lessening prejudices [and] conciliating good-will, and thereby making way for the less obstructed progress of truth."

Progressives see “crimes of conscience” everywhere and naively believe that government can fix them all by taking away other’s money and liberty. Yes, every human being bears God’s image, but the way forward is not by appealing to the fallen human heart that can be filled with foolish and utopian schemes. Rather the way forward is by returning to the tried and true ancient paths found by looking to the truth of the Word of God.

Thank you, God bless you, and God bless the United States of America.