1776 Isn’t Finished Yet.

It’s July 4, 2026. I woke up a bit sad. Well, that’s an understatement. I was very sad. There has been a cloud hanging over me all day. I will be honest. I am discouraged about all the goings on in our country. I, like many Americans and people from other nations, are asking, when will we practice the freedoms that our forefathers imagined for us as they met and discussed what we now know as the Declaration of Independence and later fought for in a Revolutionary War.

They didn’t always agree. Many of them were slave owners — and some agonized over that very contradiction even as they signed. They argued. They struck out at each other’s ideas, but when it came down to it, they wrote down something that they hoped would release us from the King of England and his oppression. They wanted freedom from tyranny. It was both a political announcement and a philosophical manifesto. Its immediate aim was to formally sever ties with Britain and justify that break to the world. They wanted support from other countries should they go to war. But its deeper purpose was to articulate why self-governance is a natural human right — not a privilege granted by kings.

This philosophical foundation was that all people are created equal and endowed with “unalienable rights – life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” It’s important to note that governments don’t grant us these rights; they exist to protect them.

They also wrote that when a government consistently violates the rights of its people, the people have not just the right but the duty to alter or abolish it and establish something better.

They had many grievances against King George – taxation without representation, quartering soldiers, dissolving legislatures, denying fair trials to name just a few.

The closing lines are perhaps the most personally courageous: the signers pledged “our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.” They knew they were signing what could be their own death warrants.

They didn’t say “these rights belong to colonists” — they said all people. That universality is both the document’s greatest gift and its greatest ongoing challenge to every generation. The question isn’t just what it meant in 1776, but what it demands of us now.

As I sit here in the last quarter of my own life, I reflect on our country’s history. It hasn’t always been pretty. We’ve made plenty of mistakes in regard to our African American and Native American brothers and sisters. We’ve done unspeakable horrors to many.

Does this mean that the Forefathers’ declaration is any less meaningful? Does it mean that it isn’t worth upholding? Even if we have to start all over from scratch, make amends, forgive everything and create a new declaration, wouldn’t it be worth it to preserve the ideal of freedom for all.

In the New Thought philosophy, we recognize freedom as a Divine birthright. We recognize that we are all free to choose the lives we will live. We preach a “world that works for everyone” not as a place where everyone gets to do what they want, but as a world that lives in respect of everyone’s freedom to live happy, healthy, loving and prosperous lives. People who want to twist those words to mean that everyone gets to do what they want aren’t really understanding the intention of a world that works for everyone.

I feel our Forefathers knew this deep in their hearts and that is why they risked their own lives to make a change. Freedom is sacred and it is embedded in our subconscious. It’s why the child rebels and leaves home when life becomes restrictive. It’s why the woman or man finally leaves their abusive partner. It’s also why others do things that might seem destructive – like the robber or the person who embezzles. These are ignorant uses of a Law that in itself is pure and unsullied. The human personality can justify anything.

Freedom is sacred because it challenges us to live from that place of Truth within each of us that knows right from wrong, compassion rather than hatred and prejudice, acceptance rather than judgment.

It is my prayer on this 4th of July that we will remember how sacred our freedom is. That we will use it with integrity and love for each other. That we will stand up for it and speak that truth and act upon it. It is my prayer on this 4th of July that just like our forefathers, we are willing to put our own lives on the line for it because we know that the same freedom we seek for ourselves is everyone’s.

No matter our gender, our color, our sexual orientation or our political beliefs, all men and women are created equal endowed with unalienable rights — life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

Living, life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness,

Dr. Rita Andriello-Feren, Author, Co-Founding Spiritual Director CSL Kaua’i

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