爱德华.肯尼迪《美国的真相与和解》英语演讲稿

2024年2月15日发(作者：婚礼女方父亲致辞简短大气)

爱德华.肯尼迪《美国的真相与和解》英语演讲稿

Edward M. Kennedy: Truth and Tolerance in America

Thank you very much Professor Kombay for that generous

introduction. And let me say, that I never expected to hear such

kind words from Dr. Falwell. So in return, I have an invitation

of my own. On January 20th, 1985, I hope Dr. Falwell will say a

prayer at the inauguration of the next Democratic President of the

United States. Now, Dr. Falwell, I’m not exactly sure how

you feel about that. You might not appreciate the President, but

the Democrats certainly would appreciate the prayer.

Actually, a number of people in Washington were surprid that

I was invited to speak here -- and even more surprid when I

accepted the invitation. They em to think that it’s easier

for a camel to pass through the eye of the needle than for a Kennedy

to come to the campus of Liberty Baptist College. In honor of our

meeting, I have asked Dr. Falwell, as your Chancellor, to permit

all the students an extra hour next Saturday night before curfew.

And in return, I have promid to watch the Old Time Gospel Hour

next Sunday morning.

I realize that my visit may be a little controversial. But as

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many of you have heard, Dr. Falwell recently nt me a membership

in the Moral Majority -- and I didn't even apply for it. And

I wonder if that means that I'm a member in good standing.

[Falwell: Somewhat]

Somewhat, he says.

This is, of cour, a nonpolitical speech which is probably

best under the circumstances. Since I am not a candidate for

President, it would certainly be inappropriate to ask for your

support in this election and probably inaccurate to thank you for

it in the last one.

I have come here to discuss my beliefs about faith and country,

tolerance and truth in America. I know we begin with certain

disagreements; I strongly suspect that at the end of the evening

some of our disagreements will remain. But I also hope that tonight

and in the months and years ahead, we will always respect the right

of others to differ, that we will never lo sight of our own

fallibility, that we will view ourlves with a n of

perspective and a n of humor. After all, in the New Testament,

even the Disciples had to be taught to look first to the beam in

their own eyes, and only then to the mote in their neighbor’s

eyes.

I am mindful of that counl. I am an American and a Catholic;

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I love my country and treasure my faith. But I do not assume that

my conception of patriotism or policy is invariably correct, or

that my convictions about religion should command any greater

respect than any other faith in this pluralistic society. I believe

there surely is such a thing as truth, but who among us can claim

a monopoly on it?

There are tho who do, and their own words testify to their

intolerance. For example, becau the Moral Majority has worked

with members of different denomination, one fundamentalist group

has denounced Dr. [Jerry] Falwell for hastening the ecumenical

church and for 〞yoking together with Roman Catholics, Mormons,

and others.〞 I am relieved that Dr. Falwell does not regard that

as a sin, and on this issue, he himlf has become the target of

narrow prejudice. When people agree on public policy, they ought

to be able to work together, even while they worship in diver

ways. For truly we are all yoked together as Americans, and the

yoke is the happy one of individual freedom and mutual respect.

But in saying that, we cannot and should not turn aside from

a deeper and more pressing question -- which is whether and how

religion should influence government. A generation ago, a

presidential candidate had to prove his independence of undue

religious influence in public life, and he had to do so partly at

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the insistence of evangelical Protestants. John Kennedy said at

that time: 〞I believe in an America where there is no religious

bloc voting of any kind.〞 Only twenty years later, another

candidate was appealing to a[n] evangelical meeting as a religious

bloc. Ronald Reagan said to 15 thousand evangelicals at the

Roundtable in Dallas: 〞 I know that you can’t endor me.

I want you to know I endor you and what you are doing.〞

To many Americans, that pledge was a sign and a symbol of a

dangerous breakdown in the paration of church and state. Yet this

principle, as vital as it is, is not a simplistic and rigid command.

Separation of church and state cannot mean an absolute paration

between moral principles and political power. The challenge today

is to recall the origin of the principle, to define its purpo,

and refine its application to the politics of the prent.

The founders of our nation had long and bitter experience with

the state, as both the agent and the adversary of particular

religious views. In colonial Maryland, Catholics paid a double

land tax, and in Pennsylvania they had to list their names on a

public roll -- an ominous precursor of the first Nazi laws against

the Jews. And Jews in turn faced discrimination in all of the

thirteen original Colonies. Massachutts exiled Roger Williams

and his congregation for contending that civil government had no

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right to enforce the Ten Commandments. Virginia harasd Baptist

teachers, and also established a religious test for public rvice,

writing into the law that no 〞popish followers〞 could hold any

office.

But during the Revolution, Catholics, Jews, and

Non-Conformists all rallied to the cau and fought valiantly for

the American commonwealth -- for John Winthrop’s 〞city

upon a hill.〞 Afterwards, when the Constitution was ratified and

then amended, the framers gave freedom for all religion, and from

any established religion, the very first place in the Bill of

Rights.

Indeed the framers themlves profesd very different faiths:

Washington was an Episcopalian, Jefferson a deist, and Adams a

Calvinist. And although he had earlier oppod toleration, John

Adams later contributed to the building of Catholic churches, and

so did George Washington. Thomas Jefferson said his proudest

achievement was not the presidency, or the writing the Declaration

of Independence, but drafting the Virginia Statute of Religious

Freedom. He stated the vision of the first Americans and the First

Amendment very clearly: 〞The God who gave us life gave us liberty

at the same time.〞

The paration of church and state can sometimes be

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frustrating for women and men of religious faith. They may be

tempted to misu government in order to impo a value which they

cannot persuade others to accept. But once we succumb to that

temptation, we step onto a slippery slope where everyone’s

freedom is at risk. Tho who favor censorship should recall that

one of the first books ever burned was the first English

translation of the Bible. As President Einhower warned in 1953, 〞Don’t join the he right to say ideas, the

right to record them, and the right to have them accessible to

others is unquestioned -- or this isn’t America.〞 And if

that right is denied, at some future day the torch can be turned

against any other book or any other belief. Let us never forget:

Today’s Moral Majority could become tomorrow’s

percuted minority.

The danger is as great now as when the founders of the nation

first saw it. In 1789, their fear was of factional strife among

dozens of denominations. Today there are hundreds -- and perhaps

even thousands of faiths -- and millions of Americans who are

outside any fold. Pluralism obviously does not and cannot mean that

all of them are right; but it does mean that there are areas where

government cannot and should not decide what it is wrong to believe,

to think, to read, and to do. As Professor Larry Tribe, one of the

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nation’s leading constitutional scholars has written, 〞Law in a non-theocratic state cannot measure religious truth, nor

can the state impo it."

The real transgression occurs when religion wants government

to tell citizens how to live uniquely personal parts of their lives.

The failure of Prohibition proves the futility of such an attempt

when a majority or even a substantial minority happens to disagree.

Some questions may be inherently individual ones, or people may

be sharply divided about whether they are. In such cas, like

Prohibition and abortion, the proper role of religion is to appeal

to the conscience of the individual, not the coercive power of the

state.

But there are other questions which are inherently public in

nature, which we must decide together as a nation, and where

religion and religious values can and should speak to our common

conscience. The issue of nuclear war is a compelling example. It

is a moral issue; it will be decided by government, not by each

individual; and to give any effect to the moral values of their

creed, people of faith must speak directly about public policy.

The Catholic bishops and the Reverend Billy Graham have every right

to stand for the nuclear freeze, and Dr. Falwell has every right

to stand against it.

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There must be standards for the exerci of such leadership,

so that the obligations of belief will not be debad into an

opportunity for mere political advantage. But to take a stand at

all when a question is both properly public and truly moral is to

stand in a long and honored tradition. Many of the great

evangelists of the 1800s were in the forefront of the abolitionist

movement. In our own time, the Reverend William Sloane Coffin

challenged the morality of the war in Vietnam. Pope John XXIII

renewed the Gospel’s call to social justice. And Dr. Martin

Luther King, Jr. who was the greatest prophet of this century,

awakened our nation and its conscience to the evil of racial

gregation.

Their words have blesd our world. And who now wishes they

had been silent? Who would bid Pope John Paul [II] to quiet his

voice against the oppression in Eastern Europe, the violence in

Central America, or the crying needs of the landless, the hungry,

and tho who are tortured in so many of the dark political prisons

of our time?

President Kennedy, who said that 〞no religious body should

ek to impo its will,〞 also urged religious leaders to state

their views and give their commitment when the public debate

involved ethical issues. In drawing the line between impod will

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and esntial witness, we keep church and state parate, and at

the same time we recognize that the City of God should speak to

the civic duties of men and women.

There are four tests which draw that line and define the

difference.

First, we must respect the integrity of religion itlf.

People of conscience should be careful how they deal in the

word of their Lord. In our own history, religion has been fally

invoked to sanction prejudice -- even slavery -- to condemn labor

unions and public spending for the poor. I believe that the

prophecy, 〞The poor you have always with you〞 is an indictment,

not a commandment. And I respectfully suggest that God has taken

no position on the Department of Education -- and that a balanced

budget constitutional amendment is a matter of economic analysis,

and not heavenly appeals.

Religious values cannot be excluded from every public issue;

but not every public issue involves religious values. And how

ironic it is when tho very values are denied in the name of

religion. For example, we are sometimes told that it is wrong to

feed the hungry, but that mission is an explicit mandate given to

us in the 25th chapter of Matthew.

Second, we must respect the independent judgments of

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conscience.

Tho who proclaim moral and religious values can offer

counl, but they should not casually treat a position on a public

issue as a test of fealty to faith. Just as I disagree with the

Catholic bishops on tuition tax credits -- which I oppo -- so

other Catholics can and do disagree with the hierarchy, on the

basis of honest conviction, on the question of the nuclear freeze.

Thus, the controversy about the Moral Majority aris not only

from its views, but from its name -- which, in the minds of many,

ems to imply that only one t of public policies is moral and

only one majority can possibly be right. Similarly, people are and

should be perplexed when the religious lobbying group Christian

Voice publishes a morality index of congressional voting records,

which judges the morality of nators by their attitude toward

Zimbabwe and Taiwan.

Let me offer another illustration. Dr. Falwell has

written--and I quote: 〞To stand against Israel is to stand

against God.〞 Now there is no one in the Senate who has stood more

firmly for Israel than I have. Yet, I do not doubt the faith of

tho on the other side. Their error is not one of religion, but

of policy. And I hope to be able to persuade them that they are

wrong in terms of both America’s interest and the justice

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of Israel’s cau.

Respect for conscience is most in jeopardy, and the harmony

of our diver society is most at risk, when we re-establish,

directly or indirectly, a religious test for public office. That

relic of the colonial era, which is specifically prohibited in the

Constitution, has reappeared in recent years. After the last

election, the Reverend James Robison warned President Reagan no

to surround himlf, as president before him had, 〞with the

counl of the ungodly.〞 I utterly reject any such standard for

any position anywhere in public rvice. Two centuries ago, the

victims were Catholics and Jews. In the 1980s the victims could

be atheists; in some other day or decade, they could be the members

of the Thomas Road Baptist Church. Indeed, in 1976 I regarded it

as unworthy and un-American when some people said or hinted that

Jimmy Carter should not be president becau he was a born again

Christian. We must never judge the fitness of individuals to govern

on the bas[is] of where they worship, whether they follow Christ

or Mos, whether they are called 〞born again〞 or 〞ungodly.〞

Where it is right to apply moral values to public life, let all

of us avoid the temptation to be lf-righteous and absolutely

certain of ourlves. And if that temptation ever comes, let us

recall Winston Churchill’s humbling description of an

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intolerant and inflexible colleague: 〞There but for the grace of

God goes God.〞

Third, in applying religious values, we must respect the

integrity of public debate.

In that debate, faith is no substitute for facts. Critics may

oppo the nuclear freeze for what they regard as moral reasons.

They have every right to argue that any negotiation with the

Soviets is wrong, or that any accommodation with them sanctions

their crimes, or that no agreement can be good enough and therefore

all agreements only increa the chance of war. I do not believe

that, but it surely does not violate the standard of fair public

debate to say it. What does violate that standard, what the

opponents of the nuclear freeze have no right to do, is to assume

that they are infallible, and so any argument against the freeze

will do, whether it is fal or true.

The nuclear freeze proposal is not unilateral, but bilateral

-- with equal restraints on the United States and the Soviet Union.

The nuclear freeze does not require that we trust the Russians,

but demands full and effective verification. The nuclear freeze

does not concede a Soviet lead in nuclear weapons, but recognizes

that human beings in each great power already have in their

fallible hands the overwhelming capacity to remake into a pile of

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radioactive rubble the earth which God has made.

There is no morality in the mushroom cloud. The black rain of

nuclear ashes will fall alike on the just and the unjust. And then

it will be too late to wish that we had done the real work of this

atomic age -- which is to ek a world that is neither red nor dead.

I am perfectly prepared to debate the nuclear freeze on policy

grounds, or moral ones. But we should not be forced to discuss

phantom issues or fal charges. They only deflect us form the

urgent task of deciding how best to prevent a planet divided from

becoming a planet destroyed.

And it does not advance the debate to contend that the arms

race is more divine punishment than human problem, or that in any

event, the final days are near. As Pope John said two decades ago,

at the opening of the Second Vatican Council: 〞We must beware of

tho who burn with zeal, but are not endowed with

we must disagree with the prophets of doom, who are always

forecasting disasters, as though the end of the earth was at hand.〞

The message which echoes across the years is very clear: The earth

is still here; and if we wish to keep it, a prophecy of doom is

no alternative to a policy of arms control.

Fourth, and finally, we must respect the motives of tho who

exerci their right to disagree.

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We sorely test our ability to live together if we readily

question each other’s integrity. It may be harder to

restrain our feelings when moral principles are at stake, for they

go to the deepest wellsprings of our being. But the more our

feelings diverge, the more deeply felt they are, the greater is

our obligation to grant the sincerity and esntial decency of our

fellow citizens on the other side.

Tho who favor E.R.A [Equal Rights Amendment] are not 〞antifamily〞 or 〞blasphemers.〞 And their purpo is not 〞an

attack on the Bible.〞 Rather, we believe this is the best way to

fix in our national firmament the ideal that not only all men, but

all people are created equal. Indeed, my mother, who strongly

favors E.R.A., would be surprid to hear that she is anti-family.

For my part, I think of the amendment’s opponents as wrong

on the issue, but not as lacking in moral character

I could multiply the instances of name-calling, sometimes on

both sides. Dr. Falwell is not a 〞warmonger.〞 And 〞liberal

clergymen〞 are not, as the Moral Majority suggested in a recent

letter, equivalent to 〞Soviet sympathizers.〞 The critics of

official prayer in public schools are not 〞Pharies〞; many of

them are both civil libertarians and believers, who think that

families should pray more at home with their children, and attend

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church and synagogue more faithfully. And people are not xist

becau they stand against abortion, and they are not murderers

becau they believe in free choice. Nor does it help

anyone’s cau to shout such epithets, or to try and shout

a speaker down -- which is what happened last April when Dr. Falwell

was hisd and heckled at Harvard. So I am doubly grateful for your

courtesy here this evening. That was not Harvard’s finest

hour, but I am happy to say that the loudest applau from the

Harvard audience came in defen of Dr. Falwell’s right to

speak.

In short, I hope for an America where neither

"fundamentalistnor "humanistwill be a dirty word, but

a fair description of the different ways in which people of good

will look at life and into their own souls.

I hope for an America where no president, no public official,

no individual will ever be deemed a greater or lesr American

becau of religious doubt -- or religious belief.

I hope for an America where the power of faith will always burn

brightly, but where no modern Inquisition of any kind will ever

light the fires of fear, coercion, or angry division.

I hope for an America where we can all contend freely and

vigorously, but where we will treasure and guard tho standards

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of civility which alone make this nation safe for both democracy

and diversity.

Twenty years ago this fall, in New York City, President Kennedy

met for the last time with a Protestant asmbly. The atmosphere

had been transformed since his earlier address during the 1960

campaign to the Houston Ministerial Association. He had spoken

there to allay suspicions about his Catholicism, and to answer

tho who claimed that on the day of his baptism, he was somehow

disqualified from becoming President. His speech in Houston and

then his election drove that prejudice from the center of our

national life. Now, three years later, in November of 1963, he was

appearing before the Protestant Council of New York City to

reaffirm what he regarded as some fundamental truths. On that

occasion, John Kennedy said: 〞The family of man is not limited

to a single race or religion, to a single city, he

family of man is nearly 3 billion strong. Most of its members are

not white and most of them are not Christian.〞 And as President

Kennedy reflected on that reality, he restated an ideal for which

he had lived his life -- that 〞the members of this family should

be at peace with one another.〞

That ideal shines across all the generations of our history

and all the ages of our faith, carrying with it the most ancient

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dream. For as the Apostle Paul wrote long ago in Romans: 〞If it

be possible, as much as it lieth in you, live peaceable with all

men.〞

I believe it is possible; the choice lies within us; as fellow

citizens, let us live peaceable with each other; as fellow human

beings, let us strive to live peaceably with men and women

everywhere. Let that be our purpo and our prayer, yours and mine

-- for ourlves, for our country, and for all the world.

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