{"id":15721,"date":"2022-07-06T11:08:58","date_gmt":"2022-07-06T15:08:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/?p=15721"},"modified":"2022-07-06T11:08:58","modified_gmt":"2022-07-06T15:08:58","slug":"mr-t-says-the-nation-that-prays-together-stays-together-in-4th-of-july-message-to-hollywood","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2022\/07\/mr-t-says-the-nation-that-prays-together-stays-together-in-4th-of-july-message-to-hollywood","title":{"rendered":"Mr. T Says, \u201cThe Nation That Prays Together, Stays Together\u201d in 4th of July Message to Hollywood"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/140\/2022\/07\/mr-t-scaled.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-15724\" src=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/140\/2022\/07\/mr-t-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"768\" height=\"576\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Mr. T, born Laurence Tureaud, shared a patriotic message for his <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/MrT\">Twitter<\/a> followers this past Independence Day. \u201cHappy Birthday America and Happy Independence Day!\u201d the Tweet started. \u201cI am so very grateful to be a citizen of the United States of America, Thank God,\u201d he added in a follow-up Tweet. His final Tweet admonished his followers, and America in general, to be united. \u201cWe the people; together we stand, divided we fall! Black and white together, we shall overcome someday!\u201d The comments are remarkable from <a href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/celebrity-faith-database\/m\/mr-t.aspx\">Mr. T,<\/a> who has cited the racism his father experienced as the reason for changing his name to his famous moniker. In a 2015 article with<a href=\"https:\/\/www.huffpost.com\/entry\/5-things-you-didnt-know-about-mr-t_n_5643d215e4b045bf3dedbec5\"> The Huffington Post<\/a>, Mr. T shared, \u201cI changed my name because as a black man growing up in white society, I watched my father being called \u2018boy,\u2019 and he was a preacher. I watched my brother coming back from the Marines and Vietnam and being called \u2018boy.\u2019 I watched enough black men in my family being called \u2018boy,\u2019 so I point to the fact: What does a black man have to do to get his respect as a man? So, when I became 18 years old, I legally changed my name to Mr. T.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The Tweets come at a time when a recent <a href=\"https:\/\/news.gallup.com\/poll\/394202\/record-low-extremely-proud-american.aspx\">Gallup poll<\/a> shows a record low 38% of Americans citing themselves as \u201cextremely proud to be an American.\u201d The poll also further highlighted growing political divisions amongst Americans, with stark differences amongst American pride depending on political party affiliation. The nation\u2019s divisions had been previously demonstrated in a 2021 survey from the <a href=\"https:\/\/centerforpolitics.org\/crystalball\/articles\/new-initiative-explores-deep-persistent-divides-between-biden-and-trump-voters\/\">University of Virginia. <\/a>The survey showed a strong amount of distrust between people of different ideologies, with each side viewing the other as either fascists or socialists. From issues like the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/news\/2005\/11\/why-overturning-roe-vs-wade-would-be-good-for-democracy.aspx\">overturning of Roe vs Wade<\/a> to gun control after the horrific <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dailywire.com\/news\/heres-what-we-know-about-the-highland-park-parade-shooter\">mass shooting in Highland Park, Illinois<\/a>,\u00a0 Americans seem more divided than ever.<\/p>\n<p>Mr. T\u2019s message is a call back to American unity and principle values. As the Declaration of Independence states in its opening lines, \u201cWe hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights\u2026\u201d Mr. T also encouraged a return to those roots, with his last lines saying, \u201cThe Nation that prays together, stays together!\u201d Or, as the Declaration of Independence concludes, \u201c&#8230;with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence&#8230;\u201d<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Mr. T, born Laurence Tureaud, shared a patriotic message for his Twitter followers this past Independence Day. \u201cHappy Birthday America and Happy Independence Day!\u201d the Tweet started. \u201cI am so very grateful to be a citizen of the United States of America, Thank God,\u201d he added in a follow-up Tweet. His final Tweet admonished his&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":462,"featured_media":15724,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fbia_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15721","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Mr. T Says, \u201cThe Nation That Prays Together, Stays Together\u201d in 4th of July Message to Hollywood<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Mr. T, born Laurence Tureaud, shared a patriotic message for his Twitter followers this past Independence Day.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" 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