In this episode of Family Talk, Dr. James Dobson and Gary Bauer reunite to discuss their timeless book, ‘Children at Risk.’ Written over three decades ago, the book forewarned of the cultural shifts that continue to challenge America’s foundational values today. Listen in as they explore the ongoing civil war of values and the pivotal role children play as the target in this ideological battleground.
You’re listening to Family Talk, the radio broadcasting division of the James Dobson Family Institute. I am that James Dobson, and I’m so pleased that you’ve joined us today.
SPEAKER 01 :
Well, welcome to Family Talk, the broadcast ministry of the Dr. James Dobson Family Institute. I’m Roger Marsh, and today’s program features a compelling conversation featuring our own Dr. James Dobson and his longtime friend and colleague, Gary Bauer. Now, Gary, of course, is Senior Vice President of Public Policy here at the James Dobson Policy Center. He’s a regular guest co-host here on the Family Talk broadcast and is also the host of the Defending Faith, Family, and Freedom podcast. Years ago, Dr. and Gary Bauer got together and and wrote a book called Children at Risk back in 1990. And in that writing, they warned about the cultural shifts threatening America’s foundational values. Though written over three decades ago, their insights remain strikingly relevant today, even prophetic, if you will, as they address what they termed the civil war of values in our society. Dr. Dobson and Gary Bauer examine how the gradual removal of Judeo-Christian principles from our culture has led to a concerning trend in how children are educated and influenced. As they noted, children are the prize to the victor in this ongoing cultural battle. So today here on Family Talk, let’s revisit an update that Dr. and Gary recorded recently on this thought-provoking discussion about the spiritual challenges facing American families and the importance of protecting our children’s hearts and minds. right now on today’s edition of Dr. James Dobson’s Family Talk. Doctor?
SPEAKER 03 :
Today, I have the privilege of talking to one of my closest friends and a colleague that I’ve been working with in the battle to protect and preserve the family for many, many years. You know him. At least you know him by name and voice. He is Gary Bauer. He’s the president of two organizations, American Values and the Campaign for Working Families, which is a PAC, a political action committee. He writes a daily report that you really should receive if you don’t get it already. There’s no cost. And I’ll tell you how to sign up for it before we’re done today, because this is very important information that comes almost every day. Gary has been one of the frontline generals in the culture war that still rages today. In the 1980s, he was undersecretary of the Department of Education with Secretary Bill Bennett. when they were in the Reagan administration. Bauer was also in the Reagan White House in the mid-1980s when he sat at the table every week with the president and his cabinet. Gary is on the phone with us now. Gary, do you remember that day when we met so long ago?
SPEAKER 02 :
Oh, my goodness, Dr. Dobson. In some ways, it seems like yesterday. In other ways, it seems like it was about 100 years ago. We’ve done a lot of these shows over the years, although there’s been a little bit of a gap here in recent years. I think the thing I remember the most is you would come into Washington and we would go up on Capitol Hill and go visit members of Congress or go listen to a debate on the floor of the House or Senate. And we would hear something that we thought the American people needed to know. And we would go off to a corner and just tape a radio show by the seat of our pants. And I’ve listened to some of those over the years, re-listened to them. And, you know, Dr. Dobson, they came out pretty darn good.
SPEAKER 03 :
It was so much fun. We felt like we were making a difference in those days. We still do. I just appreciate so much what you’re doing. We’ve been at this a long time and we fought many battles together. in defense of conservative values in those days. You went on to be president of the Family Research Council, I believe that was in 1989, where you were also vice president of Focus on the Family. So these were very meaningful years for us, weren’t they?
SPEAKER 02 :
They were, Dr. Dobson. And I think we had already been doing some work together because in the Reagan administration, periodically, I would get into trouble, even in that administration, for speaking up about the sanctity of life or family values or whatever. And you were good enough to bring me on to your radio show even during the Reagan years. You know, we used to reminisce about the fact that it made me unfireable. There were people in the Reagan White House that were more moderate, and I think they would have liked to have gotten rid of me. But you helped me develop a following by so generously sharing my voice with the millions of people that followed you.
SPEAKER 03 :
Gary, there will be people who will be surprised to hear that you had opposition even in the Reagan administration. There you were in the center of conservatism in a very conservative presidency, and yet there were people there who were dragging their heels and were in opposition to even what President Reagan was trying to do.
SPEAKER 02 :
Well, that’s the key point, Jim. I never had any disagreements with President Reagan. If I could get to him with the facts on a particular issue, he always came down on the right side. But yes, you’re also right that there were moderates in the White House, people that wanted Reagan to be something other than what he was. You may remember that our side kind of took the mantra of let Reagan be Reagan. And your shows during those Reagan years helped that happen because time after time, because of those shows, the White House would be inundated with phone calls and letters and the president would find out about that. And it helped him almost always make the right decisions.
SPEAKER 03 :
Isn’t it interesting that even when conservatives win at the ballot box, there’s still a war and there’s still a battle that has to be waged? And you and I were on one side of it, and we still are today. I haven’t changed a whole lot. Have you?
SPEAKER 02 :
I haven’t, Jim. Well, I have changed in the ways that we all change with the years. I used to get up way back then in the morning and do something at our house that Carol, my wife, started calling the morning rant. And it was just me saying what you and I would say when we were together. I don’t know if Carol’s happy about it, but I’m happy to say that when I get up in the morning now, I’m still doing that morning rant.
SPEAKER 03 :
Well, that kind of takes us to the central theme of what we’re going to talk about today because you and I were often on the phone talking about what was going on in the culture and in the government and in the family and things that we cared about. And we did rant together and we saw trends then that were deeply alarming to us. And as a matter of fact, it led eventually for us to write a book together, which was published in 1990. It was entitled Children at Risk. It’s out of print now, and I regret the fact that it is. It sold over 400,000 copies, and it struck a nerve with parents especially. And it dealt with what we call the Civil War of Values. And about four years later, 1994, you were my guest again on the radio, and we talked about that book. like i say it was four years old by that time and i have a recording of that interview with you that was first aired that year 1994 and i want to let our listeners hear you and me talking for about four minutes about the book and about what was going on in the culture we sound a whole lot younger then i’m going to let you and everybody else hear this is that okay we’re going to air that Right now. Absolutely.
SPEAKER 04 :
We have gone to some effort to bring that book up to date. It’s been four years. A lot has changed. I don’t want to break my arm patting us on the back, Gary, and be too congratulatory here. But that book was really almost prophetic in terms of what we now see happening in the world of children, wasn’t it?
SPEAKER 02 :
Jim, it really was. As we were working on the revision of it, I think we were both struck by the fact as we reread it that the things that we pointed out four years ago and that we warned people about four years ago, unfortunately, have been all too true in recent years. And I think as we redid the book, we could see where we’re going four more years from now if these trends stay in place. It was in many ways a prophetic book.
SPEAKER 04 :
Why don’t you start by expressing the philosophy, the ideas that you were trying to write in your half of that book, Gary, as kind of a way of bringing people up to speed who haven’t read it or haven’t heard us discuss it before. Yes.
SPEAKER 02 :
Well, Jim, you and I had talked many, many hours about the concept behind the book, and I think we both felt that something unusual was happening in the country. It wasn’t the typical political disagreements and so forth that you always have in a democracy over whether one program or another ought to be made into law. Rather, there was something much more basic happening. There was a drift away from reliable standards of right and wrong. Something was happening with the educational system. We saw a breakdown of the family that was unparalleled in American history. And when you looked at all these various things, it was clear that children were the ones who were going to be impacted the most by these trends. And I think we both felt that there was just this tremendous need to get to our fellow citizens about these trends and to tell them what they could do to stop them.
SPEAKER 04 :
Abraham Lincoln said the philosophy of the classroom in one generation is the philosophy of the government in the next. And I think it was recognized, especially by those who come from the secular humanistic perspective, that if they could capture… the hearts and minds of a generation of children. If they could control the textbooks and what was in them, if they could control the relationship of those children to their parents and begin to kind of seal them off, drive a wedge between generations, then it would be possible to to build into those children who didn’t have the roots or even the understanding to recognize what was happening to them, build in that new philosophical idea, which one generation later would rule the country. I believe there are those, you know, I don’t like conspiracy theories, but I really believe that there are those on the other side of this civil war of values who recognize very clearly that children are the prize to the winner of this battle and they are the keys to victory. You get a hold of their minds and you can change a country in one generation.
SPEAKER 02 :
Jim, there is absolutely no doubt about it. I think that’s why we see the whole area of education being one of the big battlegrounds in the country today. Every time in America that a parent dares go to a school board meeting and speak up, or goes to the local school and insists on talking to a teacher or to the principal and raises questions about the curriculum or about values or whatever the other side screams bloody murder because they want the ability to mold our children’s value system without any interference from parents. And I think that, as you predicted in Children at Risk, when you said that the battlefield would be the schools, that’s come to pass, and we haven’t seen anything yet. Wait till we go through the rest of this decade and see even more of these themes come up.
SPEAKER 03 :
Children at Risk has turned out to be remarkably prophetic, hasn’t it?
SPEAKER 02 :
Well, Jim, it really has. I mean, as I was listening to that, you’re absolutely right. Some of our listeners may think we actually recorded that yesterday, your references to school board meetings and when a parent shows up, how important that is. One of the arguments we made in the book, Jim, was that no society is neutral on values. if we continued to take Judeo-Christian values out of our culture and out of our schools and our families and our neighborhoods, it would be replaced by something. And I think the one thing that’s happened recently since we wrote the book is that what it’s being replaced with is becoming more and more evident. It’s not only a radical secularist philosophy, but I think increasingly it’s socialism and Marxism. In the book, we referred to the Marxism that was springing up in the university campuses. But now we’re seeing socialism and Marxism springing up everywhere in our society. Usually it’s talked about in economic terms. But, you know, I know you know this, but I’m not sure all of our listeners do. The central thing about Marxism is that it’s godless economics. It hates God. And that is what we see motivating not only our enemies abroad, countries like communist China, but we see that motivating a lot of what we’re dealing with in the United States right now.
SPEAKER 03 :
Well, I find myself lying awake at night worrying about what’s happening to today’s kids. And we did have a perspective on it then that’s very relevant today. Let me take a run at explaining the theme of the book from my point of view and in my portion of the book. We said that America was involved in a second great civil war. This one was not being fought by guns and bombs, but with values and ideas where Americans were locked in a life and death struggle for cultural influence. That’s what was going on then. And I want to bring that perspective up to date a little bit today. But on one side of this great divide was a belief that God is God. You know, from that understanding came very far reaching beliefs that touched every dimension of public and private life. It was based on the belief that there are biblical standards of right and wrong. that determine really how we’re supposed to live and how children are supposed to be taught. America then began to drift toward a notion that God isn’t. That changes everything. And it happened slowly at first, but with the influence and the decisions of the liberal courts and political influences, the Christian system of values began to wane. and there was this shift where what was right was determined by how it seemed or thought, yet not on biblical values. Everything emanating from Scripture began to sound out of date and even oppressive, and great anger was attached to it. Life was cheapened, and a sexual revolution took center stage. And you and I in this book warned in our writings that Civil wars don’t last forever. One side eventually wins and the other loses. And this is the key phrase. Children, you said it just a minute ago in that recording, children become the prize to the victor. Well, I’m here to tell you that we have largely lost that civil war of values, and children are now in the clutches of those who believe God isn’t. And it has what you referred to a minute ago as a Marxist, godless culture. the perspective on life that’s being transmitted to children. That’s what keeps me awake at night. Does that kind of summarize what we were trying to say?
SPEAKER 02 :
Jim, it’s an excellent summary. As always, you got right to the heart of the question and said it in a way that I think every mother listening, every father listening will understand completely what we’re trying to get at. You know, one of the things we discussed in the book is the uniqueness of the United States. Unlike any other country in the world, the central idea of the United States can be found in the second paragraph of the Declaration of Independence. And in that second paragraph, there’s about 23 words right in the middle of the paragraph. We all know them. We hold these truths to be self-evident that all men, it means all mankind, that all men are created equal and endowed by their government No, no. There’s plenty of places built on the idea that liberty comes from government. Our founders believe, and it says, endowed by their creator. That’s the God of Abraham. That’s the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the God that sent his son to die on the cross for our sins. And so when we get to a point in the country, which I think, Jim, you and I both believe we’re at, where more and more young people don’t even believe there is a God, then I think we’re in the middle of an existential threat. How can America be preserved as America? if a rising generation is rejecting the very idea that there is a God that was the author of our liberty. So we’re facing really tough challenges. The other thing that came to my mind, Jim, is when we wrote the book, the Soviet Union was unraveling. So we had problems 30 years ago, but our challenge from a foreign enemy was actually easing. But right now, we’ve got a rising communist China, a godless communist China. And that country believes their day is coming. When our young people are waning in our faith, when they’re waning in a love of our country, Chinese youth are on fire for their country. The irony of that, Jim, that’s what keeps me awake at night. Here are our young people living in a country that is the freest country. most decent country in the history of the world. We’ve done more to advance the cause of liberty than any country in history. And our youth are being taught that we’re evil, that we’ve never lived up to our goals, that we were built on evil from the very beginning. And then you’ve got Communist China, a country engaged in genocide. a country that makes Christian churches take down their crosses and put up photos or pictures of Chairman Xi instead, and the youth in that country are on fire believing that their day has come. That’s a witch’s brew, Jim.
SPEAKER 03 :
Well, Gary, going back to the book, the kids that we were talking about, and being concerned about at the time we wrote this, have gone on to be parents in the generation that we have seen. They’ve actually been called millennials, but many of them grew up without that understanding of right and wrong and that God is. I saw recently polls showing that only 6% of millennials believe in a Christian worldview. That means 94% do not believe that. And therefore, the next generation, the one that’s coming up now, is getting some other godless perspective because it is not consistent with what has been taught for generations and a couple of hundred years. And that is what worries me now because we’ve already lost essentially one generation. Now we’re losing another generation. And where does it go? This is a spiritual issue, not a political issue. You agree with that?
SPEAKER 02 :
I definitely agree with that, Jim. I mean, obviously, some of these battles are fought out in the political arena. And I tend to think I think you probably do, too, that some of the worst things are coming out of what we would call the political left or the cultural left. But it’s permeated everything. I mean, there are people on the right who think the only thing that matters are free markets and the free flow of capital. And the most important issues are marginal tax rates and government regulations. And look, I’m a conservative on all those things, but we can have marginal tax rates as low as you can possibly imagine them. And if our children at the same time no longer believe that this is a country built on the idea that our liberty comes from God, then the country’s doomed, no matter how low our taxes might be.
SPEAKER 03 :
Gary, we’re going to have to wrap this up. Do you have time to give us another program?
SPEAKER 02 :
Oh, I’d love to. Okay.
SPEAKER 01 :
Well, today here on Family Talk, what a journey we have taken through the prophetic insights of our own Dr. James Dobson and his friend and colleague, Gary Bauer. Their conversation about their 1990 book, Children at Risk, reminds us that the battles they identified 35 years ago haven’t disappeared. In fact, they’ve actually intensified. The cultural tug of war for our children’s hearts and minds continues to rage, perhaps with even greater urgency now than when they first sounded the alarm back in 1990. Now, if you missed any part of today’s program, you can listen again online at drjamesdobson.org. That’s drjamesdobson.org. You can share this program with a friend who might benefit from hearing this wisdom and their perspective. And by the way, if you’d like to learn more about that classic book, Children at Risk, you’ll find that information there as well. Again, that’s drjamesdobson.org for that information, where you can always find it at the Family Talk app. Another printed resource I want to draw your attention to from two beloved members of the JDFI family, mother and daughter duo Shirley and Danae Dobson have written Welcome to Our Table, a beautiful book that is a part cookbook, part family memoir, and entirely a celebration of hospitality. Perfect for this time of year. Together, they’ve collected cherished family recipes and created seasonal party ideas that will inspire you to open your home and heart to others. Now, we’ll be happy to send you a copy of Welcome to Our Table by Shirley and Danae Dobson as our way of thanking you for your gift of any amount in support of the JDFI today. So make that secure donation online at drjamesdobson.org or call us at 877-732-6825. That’s 877-732-6825. In this critical moment for America’s families, your prayers and your financial partnership with Family Talk are making a profound difference. When Dr. Dobson and Gary Bauer wrote about the civil war of values, they couldn’t have known how their warnings would actually resonate decades later. As I mentioned earlier, this book was a warning. It turned out to be prophetic. We’ll be right back. Would you consider standing with us in this important mission? Your gift today of any amount will help ensure that families receive truth-filled encouragement they need. You can give online at drjamesdobson.org or write to us at PO Box 39000, Colorado Springs, Colorado, the zip code 80949. I’m Roger Marsh, inviting you to join us again next time for part two of this important conversation featuring Dr. James Dobson and his colleague Gary Bauer discussing children at risk. That’s coming up right here on the next edition of Dr. James Dobson’s Family Talk, the voice you trust for the family you love. This has been a presentation of the Dr. James Dobson Family Institute.
