I recently sat down with Congresswoman Michele Bachmann, former Congresswoman from Minnesota and former presidential candidate, to glean her insight on the cultural moment we are living in and how Christians can bring biblical answers to our communities.
She pointed out that above even political issues, there is one key cultural issue that Christians must take notice of before entire generations are affected.
“If you look at the movies that are available on a plane, the movies that are available on Netflix, if you look at Amazon, or the offerings on TV channels, it causes your heart to take a deep pause,” Bachmann said.
Content that most Americans considered taboo—even just a decade ago—and would never imagine being appropriate to show on television or across mass media platforms is now largely accepted, even considered mainstream. There even seems to be an unspoken race among content creators to see who can push the envelope the fastest and in the most shocking way.
Bachmann sums the situation up simply, “My greatest concern is for little children. For years we were taught that it was normative in this country to have what was called in loco parentis.”
The phrase she uses here is Latin for “in the place of a parent.” By that she means that the institutions of this nation once saw it as their duty to stand in the place of parents to protect the innocence of children. That was considered a normative, a vanguard, a gold standard for the United States.
Bachmann suggests that entertainment and media companies today seem to give no thought to protecting the innocence of children, but instead more about “violating” them. She told me she is deeply concerned about the next generation because “you can’t unring a bell.”
For example, many children are being exposed to pornography at an alarmingly early age, some as young as 7 or 8. Our youngest are simply incapable of dealing with the information they’re ingesting. That type of illicit content “alters the brain for a little child,” Bachmann points out. “That’s what we really need to be concerned about,” she said, “what our little kids are ingesting—and it’s not good.”
The congresswoman and I agree. We have to get far more serious about protecting little children. If we are failing to protect the innocence of our children, what can practically be done to address this eroding cultural problem?
Bachmann provides an answer, and her own example of being a mother and foster parent speaks volumes. “There are opportunities all around you if you open up your eyes,” she encouraged.
Bachmann explained, “Our foster daughters brought nonsense home in their backpacks, and I was just floored by what they were bringing home.”
“I thought, If anyone needs a leg up, it’s a foster child, and they need to have decent academics so they will be able to get a job some day and make their own choices. So I got involved in my local schools but also at the state and federal level to try to change and revolutionize what these kids were getting in the public schools.”
“I had no interest in politics. That was not the direction I planned to go, but it was because of the negative influence on my foster children that I decided to get involved and be their advocate.”
Bachmann encouraged parents to run to the areas in their spheres of influence that God seems to be calling them and to “bring the truths of the gospel, the truths of the Bible to that issue and then just see what God will do.”
Bachmann’s recommendation is a simple yet impactful one if Christians will diligently implement it across the nation.
There are things each one of us can do to redeem our communities with godly influence and create a culture that both protects our children and advances biblical values for future generations.
To watch My Faith Votes’ full interview with Congresswoman Michele Bachmann, click here.
Jason Yates is CEO of My Faith Votes, a nonpartisan movement focused on motivating Christians in America to participate in local and national elections. By partnering with local churches, pastors and national faith leaders, My Faith Votes mobilizes and resources Christians to lead the conversation on the place of faith in culture and politics. Gov. Mike Huckabee serves as the organization’s honorary national chairman.
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