We don’t preach what James Dobson preached; we preach mercy, love

Photo: Wikimedia Commons.

There are some who will try to wrap James Dobson’s legacy in the language of faith, family, and morality. But we are not the Church that James Dobson preached.

Dobson’s version of Christianity was never about the radical love of Jesus Christ.

It was about control.

It was about fear.

It was about using the Bible as a weapon to enforce rigid roles for men and women, to deny dignity to LGBTQ people, and to roll back the progress of justice.

He created an empire that taught millions of Christians to believe that defending “family values” meant policing other people’s lives.

That is not the Gospel.

That is idolatry.

He was known to tell families to throw out their LGBTQ children, warning them that to welcome their child was to defy God’s teaching.

He told battered and abused women to return to their husbands, saying they would be derelict in their marriage vows if they left. These teachings brought devastation into countless homes. They did not heal. They harmed.

The Church I belong to is different.

We do not stand at the gate with stones in our hands.

We stand at the table with bread and cup, open to all.

We do not preach that women are secondary, or that queer people are broken.

We preach that all are created in the image of God, all are called into the abundant life that Christ promised, and all are worthy of love.

Dobson’s theology killed.

It killed through shame, through stigma, through the laws and policies it inspired.

It drove LGBTQ youth into despair.

It told women that their safety did not matter.

It told families that their love was invalid.

That is not the work of Christ. That is the work of empire.

We reject that legacy. We choose another path. We choose to be the Church that welcomes the stranger, that protects the vulnerable, that lifts up the oppressed.

We choose to be the Church that Jesus envisioned: where love is stronger than fear, where justice is greater than judgment, where freedom is not rationed by doctrine.

James Dobson preached a narrow, punishing faith. We will not carry that torch.

We are the Church that stands for life, liberty, and the pursuit of joy for all God’s children.

We are not his Church. And we never will be.