The Battle is Real
Dateline: August 11th, in the Year of our Lord 2022
On Monday of this week, I arrived early for a board meeting at the classical Christian school I've been part of for almost 30 years. By happenstance, Paul was waiting for me. He had gray hair and his kids were grown. I'd not met him before, but he had just read Battle for the American Mind and relayed a story I've now heard repeated over and over since the book was released.
His kids went to progressive Christian school and then to a secular liberal arts college. They veered left. He so wished he had known of classical Christian education. If only…
But, here's the catch. A classical Christian school is not always enough. I've seen students from families at our ACCS schools go left at Christian colleges that are, well, pretty far left. So, send them to a conservative Christian college, right? I've seen that fail too. I've known students who rebel in this situation and embrace an LGBT lifestyle. So, should we give up? No. We have a great hope.
The family is key. If your family teaches solid Christian AND conservative lifestyles — and you connect the two and give reasons why — your kids will have a fighting chance. Put them at a classical Christian school and the odds go up measurably. Send them to a college like Hillsdale or New Saint Andrews college and the odds are better than 90% that they will remain faithful.
Ben Merkle, president of New Saint Andrews college, has a good illustration. According to his research, your child's chances at just about any college are worse than the chances they would survive the Normandy landing on D-day. But there were better and worse odds on that fateful day. Omaha Beach, for example, saw 2811 brave souls die. On Utah Beach, only 197 died. So how do we increase the odds in this very real battle for our kids' souls?
First, what you do at home is the biggest factor. Teach them Christianity. Children raised saturated in the Christian faith — and deep, applied theology — are the best armored. Then, according to research from the Good Soil study conducted by Notre Dame University, your best bet is an ACCS school. Put them in a conservative Christian college (there are only a handful of them) and the odds increase well into the 90% range.
I pray that the heartache of so many older parents will be a roadmap for the younger generation of Christian parents. Now that we know we're in a battle against the spirit of our age, we can and should do everything we can to increase the odds. Which brings me to the last and most important action parents can take.
Pray unceasingly for your children. We should never believe that we can control the destiny of our kids. Only God controls that. Over the years, parents have come to me whose children were “off the deep end" and then they remembered something. Somewhere in their 30s, God called them back. Paideia works that way. It lingers deep in the soul and can be rekindled. Their time spent in ACCS schools or at a conservative college will return. Prayer is the best tool. Use it.
Paul is giving Battle for the American Mind to just about everyone he knows with kids. This is a refrain I’ve heard repeatedly over the past few weeks. He’s doing what he can for others. Bless him. I pray that God will use him in this battle, and will return his kids to the truth, goodness, and beauty of the Gospel.
