by Joanne Wiklund
Today is Flag Day. The first flag officially approved by the Continental Congress was flown on June 14, 1777. Here we are in 2024 and it’s not Monday. It’s the actual day it was flown. Our US flag is important to the history of our country. The flag raising on Iwo Jima is a graphic everyone recognizes. We learned the Pledge of Allegiance in grade school.
“I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.”
A pledge: a thing given as a token of love, favor or loyalty
Allegiance: loyalty to a cause
Do we teach children that anymore? Do we teach them to respect the flag? I saw a facebook post the other day with a photo of a small boy stopped behind a grandstand where everyone was standing. Evidently the National Anthem was playing. He stood at attention saluting with four bags of popcorn on the ground in front of him. It could have been staged, the popcorn sacks were too straight and in line. He was probably maybe six or seven years old.
But does it matter if it was staged? Will it remind us all to salute or put our hand over our heart? To participate in the Pledge? To remind us that this republic was formed as one nation under God? That it was thought by the Congress to be indivisible? What a great word. Only God can make it work now. Unless we all pay attention and remember why it was formed.
John 13:34-35 A new commandment I give unto you, that ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another. By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another.