Ruth knows I am a history nut. She gave me the book In the Dark Streets Shineth by David McCullough and published by Shadow Mountain. It also has a DVD that came with it taken from the 2009 Tabernacle Choir Christmas program. I haven't watched that yet. I do not need to in order to love the gift because I read the book.
It is the story of when in December of 1941, just weeks after Pear Harbor was bombed and the United States entered World War Two, Winston Churchill made a highly secret voyage across the Atlantic to join President Franklin Delano Roosevelt for the lighting of the National Christmas Tree and to participate in the President's Christmas Eve broadcast to the nation.
The story is inspiring. It also highlights the stark contrast between a 1941 president and his country full of people of faith as compared to our current national leadership that discourages open expressions of faith and will not even refer to the holiday as "Christmas." How far we have fallen.
I would love to quote in full both President Roosevelt's and Prime Minister Churchill's 1941 Christmas Eve addresses to the American people, but will only give a few words from of each. These speeches are probably in the Library of Congress collection, but I will steer clear of any copyright issues at this time. It is well worth it to purchase this beautiful book with its period photographs and the full story in order to read the speeches in their entirety.
President Roosevelt: "...We are confident in our devotion to country, in our love of freedom, in our inheritance of courage. But our strength, as the strength of all men everywhere, is of greater avail as God upholds us.
"Therefore, I...do hereby appoint the first day of the year 1942 as a day of prayer, of asking for forgiveness for our shortcomings of the past, of consecration to the tasks of the present, and of asking God's help in the days to come."
Winston Churchill: "I spend this anniversary and festival far from my country, far from my family, yet I cannot truthfully say that I feel far from home....Let the children have their night of fun and laughter....Let us grown-ups share to the full in their unstinted pleasures before we turn again to the stern task and the formidable years that lie before us, resolved that, by our sacrifice and daring, these same children shall not be robbed of their inheritance or denied the right to live in a free and decent world.
"And so, in God's mercy, a happy Christmas to you all."
In the Dark Street Shineth on Shadow Mountain
In the Dark Streets Shineth on Amazon
In the Dark Streets Shineth on Barnes & Noble
