Nothing opens your mind to new worlds and new possibilities better than a book. Stories can communicate ideas, themes, and lessons considerably better than a lecture does. Children love to act out the stories of their favorite characters, adopting their mannerisms and wishing to be them. You probably can think of a book that has impacted you deeply and maybe even encouraged you to change your behavior in some manner.

Stories are incredibly powerful, sometimes bringing about great change in a culture.

Throughout history, various groups and organizations have banned books for a myriad of reasons: they were deemed inappropriate or immoral, the ideas proliferated were considered dangerous or heretical, or a tyrant thought they would stir up unrest and opposition to his rule.

Book banning is not a good thing. Because of the innate sinfulness of humanity, banning one book opens the door for unjust people or groups to ban anything they choose.

Lately, so-called book banning has been forefront in the news; a story complicated by the narrative the media is spinning. In 2020, when everything shut down due to Covid, public schooling moved to Zoom, and parents could see what their children were being taught and the material they were assigned, including the books their kids were reading.

At some point during all of this, it was discovered that there are books in elementary through high school libraries that are highly pornographic. This is not an exaggeration. If you don’t believe me, watch this video posted by a concerned mother  (WARNING: graphic content).

Understandably, parents began forming groups to advocate for having more of a say in what their children are learning in public schools and began rightly contesting books such as Gender Queer, All Boys aren’t Blue, and Lawn Boy, reading them out loud at school board meetings, requesting that schools remove them from their libraries, and asking that they provide age-appropriate reading material only.

Now the media is attacking parents and parental rights groups like Moms for Liberty. The story is being framed to make it look like these parents are trying to ban books because they are bigots who don’t want their children exposed to “diverse” ideas. They’re comparing concerned parents to Big Brother in George Orwell’s 1984 (which is ironic, since in 1984 it was Big Brother that was providing people with porn).

Without coming right out and saying it, they’re purporting that schools should have these books in their libraries precisely because parents don’t want their kids to read them. The idea seems to be, “What if those poor kids feel uncomfortable with who they are and need a place to express themselves and learn about every aspect of the LGBTQIA agenda without the involvement of their mean, strict parents?”

Not only is this a twisted spin on the facts, but it is a downright lie. Banning a book means that the book is banned. It’s illegal to buy, sell, read, or own, and anyone caught with it would face punishment. That isn’t what these parents are requesting. Asking that a book be removed from a school library because of inappropriate content doesn’t vilify the parent.

Similarly, we wouldn’t blame a parent for taking a phone away from their child who is doing things he or she isn’t supposed to with it. Children aren’t allowed to go to tattoo parlors or tanning salons, and we rate movies based on the content because there are things children (and people in general) should not see.

Requesting only age-appropriate content in public schools doesn’t constitute a ban.

Much of the reasoning behind the media’s spin of the story is because most, if not all, of the contested books are LGBTQIA+ related. Our culture is obsessed with self– personal autonomy, total unrestricted freedom, and the pursuit of making oneself happy. It’s a worldview that says, “Anything goes, but if you get in the way of my anything, you need to go.”

But freedom in this world isn’t unlimited. Free societies still have laws and legal consequences for breaking them because people do bad things. If those things were allowed to continue without repercussions, society would collapse. Insisting on having the freedom to gratify the desires of the flesh ends up in slavery to death and eternal destruction.

The backbone of true freedom is Biblical morality.

Some things absolutely should be illegal. In reality, the LGBTQIA+ movement has to do with a grotesque focus on sex. It’s openly targeting children, who, be they seven or seventeen, ought to be guarded against, not exposed to pornography. Adults shouldn’t be filling their minds with it either.

Stories have the power to change minds, for good or for evil. Requesting that a school provide only age-appropriate material is a good thing, and very different from book banning.

The great evil in America for over two centuries was slavery and its ugly aftermath. Too many Christians for too long stood passive as Satan attacked the humanity of African Americans. Too few had the courage to do what Wheaton College founder, pastor, and tenacious abolitionist Jonathan Blanchard did. Here is but one example:

During their trip from Cincinnati to Galesburg, in order to observe the Sabbath as a day of rest, the Blanchard family took lodgings in a hotel in slave territory. On that Sabbath morning, just before breakfast, out in the back yard of the hotel, a slave girl was unmercifully flogged, so severely that blood from wounds in her back fell to the ground around her. At the breakfast table some of the guests of the hotel were laughing and joking about the incident. Finally, Jonathan Blanchard could stand it no longer. He arose, and was about to leave the room. Then, realizing the meaning of retreat on his part, he turned and apologized for being too cowardly to testify against their actions. Directly facing those who made light of such barbarity, he said, “For every drop of slave blood that was shed, God will require white blood!”

Then came the Civil War.

Blanchard was not alone among pastors. Charles Spurgeon spoke too in plain, bold language about the evil of slavery:

I do from my inmost soul detest slavery . . . and although I commune at the Lord’s table with men of all creeds, yet with a slave-holder I have no fellowship of any sort or kind. Whenever one has called upon me, I have considered it my duty to express my detestation of his wickedness, and I would as soon think of receiving a murderer into my church … as a man stealer.

Lest anyone in our post-racial society think that such a statement was without cost, here’s some of what Spurgeon endured:

Spurgeon’s character was assassinated throughout the Confederacy. His sermons, which in 1862-1863 sold one million copies annually, were censured. His books, which sold 1,000 copies per minute at trade shows, were publicly destroyed. Sermon bonfires illuminated jail yards, plantations, and bookshops throughout the Southern states.

Here’s another response from the citizens of Montgomery, Alabama prior to the burning of Spurgeon’s books:

We trust that the works of the greasy cockney vociferator may receive the same treatment throughout the South. And if the pharisaical author should ever show himself in these parts, we trust that a stout cord may speedily find its way around his eloquent throat.

Today, Satan remains committed to dividing people by race, but he’s also attacking other biblical truths with a delighted vengeance. For 70 years, he has been attacking with relish biblical truths regarding sexuality and marriage.

So, where are today’s pastors and political leaders who are willing to speak unpopular truths about the evil of the normalization of sexual perversion as Blanchard and Spurgeon spoke about the evil of slavery? Are today’s pastors willing to say that they “detest” “trans”-cultism and that they will “have no fellowship of any sort or kind” with those who chemically and surgically mutilate children’s bodies? Are there pastors—including pastors of the renown of Charles Spurgeon—who consider it “their duty to express their detestation” of the madness and wickedness of gender theory, same-sex faux-marriage, and sexually integrated private spaces?

I know of one political leader who recently dared to speak truth in a culture where evil is taught as good. North Carolina’s black, Republican Lieutenant Governor Mark Robinson is under fire for speaking this truth in April at Asbury Baptist Church in Seagrove, North Carolina:

There’s no reason anybody anywhere in America should be telling any child about transgenderism, homosexuality, any of that filth. And yes, I called it filth. And if you don’t like it that I called it filth, come see me and I’ll explain it to you.

To be clear, “filthy” means “contemptibly offensive; objectionable.” So, yes, socially constructed leftist ontological and moral beliefs about homoerotic acts and cross-sex impersonation are filthy. Teaching them to children is evil.

Most conservatives can’t muster sufficient courage to oppose the wickedness leavening our culture even as children are being chemically and surgically mutilated. Many Christians have the means to homeschool, to educate their children in co-ops, or to send them to Christian private schools but choose instead to send them to government schools to be tutored by people who lack the wisdom or fortitude to oppose evil lies. Those parents are not fulfilling God’s command to “train up a child in the way he should go.”

If conservatives don’t realize that teaching children anything positive about cross-sex impersonation and homosexuality is evil, we are in deep trouble. If Christians don’t so realize, we’re in even deeper trouble. If Christian conservatives have become so worldly and deceived that they believe the chief end of man is to please the ungodly, the church is lost. If Christians believe that being a “welcoming, inclusive, and diverse” church entails silence on or affirmation of sexual sin, the church and culture are lost.

In 2014, I first wrote that the end goal of the “trans” cult is the eradication of all public recognition of sex differences. I have written that every year since 2014. Because of the ignorance, cowardice, silence, and capitulation of conservatives, that end fast approaches.

No more single sex bathrooms, locker rooms, dorm rooms, or prison cells. British Airways, Congress, and government schools are eliminating all things “gendered.” No more addressing “boys,” “girls,” “ladies,” or “gentlemen.” No more references to “sisters” and “brothers.” No more references in medical schools to “pregnant women.” Tampon machines in boys’ restrooms in elementary schools.

Our cowardice now bequeaths a neutered future to our children and grandchildren, maintained by tyrannical oppression that we should all be able to see on the darkening horizon.

Listen to this article read by Laurie:

https://staging.illinoisfamily.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/Cowardice-and-The-Orwellian-Neutering-of-America.mp3

We want to extend a personal invitation to each of you, to join our families for 2020 ICHE Legislative Days on March 30 & 31 in Springfield. It’s a two day educational smorgasbord for your homeschooling children: history, current events, political science, speech, interpersonal communication, P.E., architecture, religion, art, law, and the list goes on and on… Add on fellowship with like-minded believers; it doesn’t get much better than this.

As wonderful as these things are, however, they are not the main purpose of our gathering. ICHE Legislative Days, especially Cherry Pie Day, is a proactive effort to remind our legislators–as well as our governor–that homeschoolers are very, very politically active, and we zealously protect our hard-fought-for homeschooling rights. It is a worthwhile investment in our children’s and grandchildren’s lives, as we remember that is much easier to keep our liberties than regain them once they are lost.

The three cases dealt with quite different issues.

In National Institute of Family Life Advocates v. Becerra, a 5-4 majority of the court overturned a California statute that required anti-abortion crisis pregnancy centers to inform clients where they could obtain free or inexpensive abortions — something the centers regard as homicide.

The same 5-4 majority in a second case, Janus v. American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, reversed a 41-year-old precedent and ruled that public employees don’t have to pay unions fees that cover the cost of collective bargaining. Echoing a position taken by then-President Franklin Roosevelt in the 1930s, the court reasoned that collective bargaining with a public employer is inevitably a political matter, and that forcing employees to finance it is compelling them to subsidize political speech with which they disagree.

In the third case, Masterpiece Cakeshop Ltd. v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission, the court avoided a direct decision on whether a baker, whose Christian belief opposed same-sex marriage, could refuse to design a custom wedding cake for a same-sex couple, contrary to a state law that bars discrimination against gays. Seven justices ruled that the commission showed an impermissible animus against religion, but the four liberal justices endorsed a separate opinion indicating they’d rule against the baker otherwise.

Rational arguments can now be made for the dissenters’ positions. In Becerra, they argued that the law simply prevented misleading advertising; in Janus, they argued that union members should pay for services rendered; in Masterpiece Cakeshop, they argued that selling a cake is a routine service, not a form of expression. You may not agree, but you can see why others might make these arguments.

But are they “liberal”? That word comes from a Latin root that means “free.”

And “free” is the keyword in the First Amendment to the Constitution, which bars Congress from passing laws “prohibiting the free exercise” of religion or “abridging the freedom of speech or of the press.”

The Supreme Court First Amendment jurisprudence got its start almost exactly 100 years ago, in cases challenging laws passed by a Democratic Congress and endorsed by a Democratic administration, prohibiting opposition to the government and, specifically, American participation in World War I.

The justices hesitated to block such prosecutions, but those considered “liberal” — Republican appointee Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes and Democratic appointee Justice Louis Brandeis — were most likely to look askance. The American Civil Liberties Union was founded in 1920 to defend the free speech rights of everyone, even vile extremists.

Unhappily, the ACLU today subordinates free speech to other values, like defending the sensibilities of certain students on campuses. And other liberals have been moving in the same direction. It’s less important for them that people say what they think and more important that they say what the government requires.

In his Bagehot blog, the Economist’s Adrian Wooldridge describes the process. Historically, he says, liberals understood that conflict was inevitable and tried to foster freedom based on their distrust of power, faith in progress and belief in civic respect. But today, Wooldridge writes, “liberalism as a philosophy has been captured by a technocratic-managerial-cosmopolitan elite.” They have moved from making “a critique of the existing power structure” to becoming “one of the most powerful elites in history.” In response, we see “a revolt of the provinces against the city”: Brexit, Donald Trump. In counter-response, as Niall Ferguson puts it in a column for The Times of London, “‘liberals’ are increasingly authoritarian.”

Like the “liberal” Supreme Court justices, who don’t see a constitutional problem with compelling crisis pregnancy centers to send messages they find repugnant, or requiring union members to subsidize political speech they disagree with, or forcing people to participate in ceremonies prohibited by their religion.

In the process, they are providing support for Friedrich Hayek‘s argument in “The Road to Serfdom” that moving toward socialism means moving toward authoritarianism. And they seem to not have noticed Yale Law Professor Stephen Carter‘s observation, as quoted in The Atlantic, that “every law is violent” because “Behind every exercise of law stands the sheriff.”

Carter calls for “a degree of humility” in passing and enforcing laws that compel speech against conscience — something today’s “liberals” seem to have forgotten.

Michael Barone is a senior political analyst for the Washington Examiner, resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and longtime co-author of The Almanac of American Politics.

This article originally posted at Creators.com

Civil Discourse, Liberal Education & Freedom

Over the past few years, I’ve had the privilege of speaking at college campuses across the country. Most of the schools, as you might imagine, are Christian institutions or schools with a more traditionalist or conservative worldview, such as Hillsdale College.

But there are exceptions. A few weeks ago, I was one of five people honored with honorary doctorates by The University of the South in Sewanee, Tennessee. For those of you unfamiliar with the school, it’s affiliated with the Episcopal Church and it’s one of the top liberal arts colleges in the country.

Outwardly, everything about Sewanee cries “tradition”—the buildings, the beautiful 13,000-acre setting in the Cumberland Mountains and the convocation at which I addressed the student body. But politically and theologically, it’s fair to say that Sewanee is better described as “progressive.” So much so that a dear friend of mine was actually upset that I accepted the invitation.

In my convocation address I said that there is a move afoot on campuses “to marginalize and even to demonize voices of traditional and historic Christian faith. . . and that this is troubling . . . because to think we can have real and enduring freedom and real liberal education without robust voices of faith ignores history.” What’s more, these expressions of faith cannot be limited to the private sphere—they must circulate in the free marketplace of ideas.

I spoke of Os Guinness’ “Golden Triangle” of freedom, virtue, and faith, all of which depend on each other, which is why standing up for religious freedom is so vital for any healthy society.

And then I urged students to “listen respectfully” to those with whom they disagree, because “This is at the heart of liberal education and it’s at the heart of democracy and freedom.”

At the time I thought it went rather well. But then I read an opinion piece published in the student newspaper. It called my speech “one of the most offensive and disgusting” the writer had ever witnessed. It said that, “Beneath a thin veneer of reason and civil discourse,” I “continued to push [my] evangelical agenda.”

According to the writer, the response to my address in the audience was “shock” and “dismay.” Now the newspaper printed this without linking to my actual speech or even writing an article about the speech.

But it wasn’t only that writer. One of the clergymen on campus wrote me and told me while he was in “complete agreement” with what I said, some of his parishioners were “incensed,” even though they could not tell him why they felt that way.

Trying to get to the bottom of it, the clergyman checked with one of the other people honored, the great N.T. Wright, who told him that he found my remarks “quite unobjectionable.”

I’m happy to say that some people wrote to thank me for what I had to say and expressed their gratitude that their children got to hear what I had to say.

It would be disingenuous for me to claim that I was completely surprised by the negative reaction. Not because I set out to offend anyone, but because small “o” orthodoxy itself is increasingly offensive in some religious circles. But no one seemed to be able to say what in the speech bothered them. They just flat out were offended.

On a positive note, the fact that the leadership at Sewanee invited me in the first place speaks volumes about their commitment to free speech and civil discourse. My deepest thanks to them for giving me the opportunity to speak the truth in love to people who might disagree with me.

And whether or not some find that offensive, speaking the truth in love is the right thing to do; because if we grow silent out of fear that we’ll be shouted down or criticized, we’ll soon lose our right to speak freely at all. And that would be disastrous, not only for preaching the Gospel, but for maintaining a free and truly tolerant society.