In the United States, 1983 was designated as the national Year of the Bible by President Ronald Reagan by Proclamation 5018, made on February 3, 1983 at the annual National Prayer Breakfast. President Reagan was authorized and requested to so designate 1983 by Public Law 97-280 (Senate Joint Resolution 165], 96 Stat. 1211) passed by Congress and approved on October 4, 1982.
The law recited that the Bible "has made a unique contribution in shaping the United States as a distinctive and blessed nation and people" and that, quoting President Jackson, the Bible is "the rock on which our Republic rests". It also acknowledged a “national need to study and apply the teachings of the Holy Scriptures.” “Can we resolve to reach, learn and try to heed the greatest message ever written, God’s Word, and the Holy Bible?” Reagan asked. “Inside its pages lie all the answers to all the problems that man has ever known.”
On May 7, 2009, Rep. Paul Broun Jr. sponsored House concurrent resolution 121 (of the 111th Congress), which would have encouraged the president to declare 2010 as "The National Year of the Bible" and to "issue a proclamation calling upon citizens of all faiths to rediscover and apply the priceless, timeless message of the Holy Scripture which has profoundly influenced and shaped the United States". The resolution died in a referral to committee.
On January 30, 2012, Pennsylvania state lawmakers declared 2012 the "Year of the Bible". The Resolution passed by the Pennsylvania House of Representatives, HR 535, has faced resistance from atheist groups. In response, an atheist group, American Atheists, paid for the placement of a billboard in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania that protests the bill.
Famous quotes containing the words year and/or bible:
“Living more lives than one, knowing people of all classes, all shades of opinion, monarchists, republicans, socialists, anarchists, has had a salutary effect on my mind. If every year of my life, every month of the year, I had lived with reformers and crusaders I should be, by this time, a fanatic. As it is I have had such varied things to do, I have had so many different contacts that I am not even very much of a crank.”
—Rheta Childe Dorr (1866–1948)
“Intense study of the Bible will keep any writer from being vulgar, in point of style.”
—Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772–1834)