Shannon’s Testimony and Plea to End Obedience-Based Christian Parenting
Shannon Evans pleas for an end to Obedience-Based Christian Parenting, especially for adopted children, in a very well written post. This is a good post to share with pro-spankers because she explains the danger of the mindset without condemning spankers. I realize that many of my followers are disappointed in this post and claiming that it does not go far enough. We have to understand that there is a time and place for baby steps. People rarely jump from pro-spanker to anti-spanker in moment of epiphany. Such a change is usually a long, arduous journey. Information taken in at each step of the way will either push them further along on the way or push them backwards. A blog post which condemns all spanking is often rejected and may even push them right back to their starting spot. It is clear from this post that the author has come a long way and is in danger of alienating many people she loves by posting this. I applaud her courage and passionate plea.
Twitter
Facebook
email
Print
Tumblr
Digg
del.icio.us
StumbleUpon
Add to favorites
Reddit
Finally, some comments on this subject by Christians who have a brain astute enough to see through the Obedience-Based parenting fostered by not just Dobson and the Pearls, but also Ted Tripp, who combines these methods with parental access to a child’s heart and even the ability to control that heart, something not even God claims to possess! Shannon Evans’ comments cut through all the mind-numbing propaganda of the pro-spankers to the truth that their proposed methods are not just questionable but actually harmful and irresponsible. I must say she is much more charitable than I would have been. The parents who use these methods are NOT always motivated by a sincere desire to obey God. Some of them are controllers who just happen to have a very small, helpless victim living in their homes who has little power to fight back against their control. I know because these methods are being used by a certain individual in my family, and I grieve every day seeing the outcome it is producing in the children against whom she is using them. To those parents who have bought the lie that children are born “sinners” who must have the devil beaten out of them, let me remind you about what Jesus said about them: “Let the little children come to me for of such is the kingdom of heaven.” You may choose to continue to follow these writers of books promoting reflexive obedience (who, by the way, make quite a lot of money from the sale of their books), or you may choose, as I do to, to follow the words of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. You decide.