While we welcome people of all faiths in America we cannot be so naïve as to expect all countries to do the same. But we cannot allow their cultural mores to snuff out our religious freedoms or the freedom of women to have equal rights.

None of us are perfect, and we all make mistakes. But the American people are a very forgiving people.

A surgeon will cut off a limb in order to protect the body from disease. And a commander-in-chief should pull out of a war that cannot be won in order to protect a nation.

The world that we live in is full of distractions and pleasures that pull us away from a spiritual life. Even our jobs which are a very necessary and important part of our lives can end up being the altar at which we pray. They consume most of our waking hours and provide the income on which we are dependent in order to take care of our families.

We spend more time at cinemas, theaters, art galleries and theme parks than we do at churches, and they have become our new cathedrals. We can spend hours at any of these places of entertainment but if church service goes on too long we get impatient.

In so many things, growth comes from adversity.

When we die our money, fame, and honors will be meaningless. We own nothing in this world. Everything we think we own is in reality only being loaned to us until we die. And on our deathbed at the moment of death, no one but God can save our souls.