President Theodore Roosevelt addressed the National Congress with the following speech.
Read it, and read it again. Ponder it, chew on it, and pass it along. I am blown away at how clearly our forefathers understood the strength of the nation, how plain a civilization’s success depended largely upon its women, and how we take that God-given power today and TRAMPLE it!
The irony of this whole thing just behooves me…literally, God placed the power in OUR hands…to help a man be what he should be…to raise up strong children of character, to shape a culture.
And we whine about how “oppressive” biblical womanhood is…forgive me, but it’s really stupid when you think about it!
Eve abused the power she was given and set the whole course of humanity at odds with God.
Mary embraced the power she was given and allowed Him to redeem the world through her.
What will we do with the power we have been given?
“No piled-up wealth, no splendor of material growth, no brilliance of artistic development, will permanently avail any people unless its home life is healthy…unless the average woman is a good wife, a good mother, able and willing to perform the first and greatest duty of womanhood, able and willing to bear, and to bring up as they should be brought up, healthy children, sound in body, mind, and character, and numerous enough so that the race shall increase and not decrease.
There are certain old truths which will be true as long as this world endures, and which no amount of progress can alter. One of these is the truth that the primary duty of the husband is to be the home-maker, the breadwinner for his wife and children, and that the primary duty of the woman is to be the helpmate, the housewife, and mother…Into the woman’s keeping is committed the destiny of the generations to come after us…
The women’s task is not easy–no task worth doing is easy–but in doing it, and when she has done it, there shall come to her the highest and holiest joy known to mankind, and having done it, she shall have the reward prophesied in Scripture; for her husband and her children, yes, and all people who realize that her work lies at the foundation of all national happiness and greatness, shall rise up and call her blessed.” (emphasis mine)
4 comments
WOW!!! What an awesome and much needed speech. If only the leaders of our nation still thought according to Scripture! It’s so true that “the hand who rocks the cradle rules the world”. That has always been and will always be true. It’s only if women(both young and old) embrace true Biblical womanhood, that this nation will continue to be free. I’ve tried to tell countless people that feminism was begun as a philosophy here in the West, by Karl Marx and his buddies back in the 1840s. And a lot of these people(those who are pro-feminism, by the way) attempt to prove that this simply couldn’t be the case. However, I have even more proof thanks to the following great blog posts by Mr. Doug Phillips. I encourage you all to check these out:
http://www.visionforum.com/hottopics/blogs/dwp/
To read the ones I’m referring to, just scroll down a little. The following quote by Nickolai Lenin really stood out to me: “The building of socialism will begin only when we have achieved the complete equality of women and when we undertake the new work together with women who have been emancipated from that petty stultifying, unproductive work[housework and homemaking]…We are setting up model institutions, dining-rooms and nurseries, that will emancipate women from housework.” Shocking, isn’t it?! Feminism was, is, and will always be about making all nations socialistic and communistic and about dethroning God. For, in his own words, those were Marx’s reasons for beginning the philosophy of feminism: “to destroy capitalism and to dethrone God.” This is just one reason why it’s so very, very wrong and detrimental for Christians to support feminism.
Great post, Mrs. Crawford! Where did you come across this speech?
Many blessings,
Rebekah
WW, good post! btw, today is National Wear Your Apron Day!
BRAVO!
They may be out of print today, but Teddy Roosevelt wrote several books on the home and the family!