INDEED.
Have you read the quotes ref’d in my tagline link?
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/religion/2130557/posts?page=81#81
I just read the OP, I will read the rest as I can (am posting between doing other things). I’m afraid I am becoming-perhaps fatalistic isn’t the right word-as things progress. I know that there is a an end, according to my Christian beliefs, which can be perhaps be avoided for a time, but not ultimately. America doesn’t seem to figure in that end. I have never had the reality of that scenario more forcefully brought home to me than in these last years. The reality of it seems to be upon us. Perhaps it can yet be abated for a while, but not forever. I don’t think that should ever mean that we give up and give in, lest we be abettors of evil, but if we’re believers we do so with our eyes wide open.
This is of course, as always, just my opinion.