Parental Rights—A Worthy Hill to Rest in Peace
We are not only fighting a great evil, but we are showing our children what things are worth fighting for, and, in that context, our silence speaks volumes.
God bless Pastor John K. Amanchukwu Sr. He is the salt-and-light follower of Christ who is exposing the filth being taught to our children in public schools. He was recently removed from a school board meeting where he simply read from a pornographic book available to young students at Indian River County in Florida. What he read is graphic and lewd, so I will not write it out for you, but suffice it to say that, as soon he started reading, he was interrupted and escorted out by officers because he would not stop reading it.
It is not the first time the pastor has stood up for children. In my favorite clip out of a school board meeting in Asheville School District in North Carolina, he reads some of the smut given to children, and when he is stopped, he revealingly asks, “Was it something I said?”
One cannot help but laugh at the ridiculousness of it all, but then he asked the common sense question every rational parent has been asking for years as the radical indoctrination and immoral sexualization of our children at the hands of leftist school officials continues to ramp up. He said, “If you don’t want to hear it in a school board meeting, why should children be able to check it out of the school system?”
Pastor Amanchukwu is effective because he channels the feelings and emotions of millions of parents. In the Indian River County meeting, his appeal was followed by the efforts of multiple parents who were at the meeting and followed his example, reading from some of the books that are unbelievably offered in public schools. They were all shut down.
They also won. The school board was forced to remove dozens of books.
Parents’ voices are crucial if we are ever to turn the tide on the immorality that has gripped our educational system and nation. The radical ideology that plagues us has been seething in our academia and culture for decades. Only the unbreakable bond of family can break it. The unconditional love of mothers and fathers is the only thing strong enough to willingly and selflessly give the sacrifice needed to preserve human flourishing for our children and grandchildren.
I appeal to you, therefore, mothers, fathers, grandmothers, and grandfathers reading: join the fight. Your wisdom and common sense are needed. Your consistency and endurance are paramount. Speak up for truth and justice. Protect our children’s innocence. The fight will not be easy, but it is undoubtedly worthwhile. Freedom is never free. We are not only fighting a great evil, but we are showing our children what things are worth fighting for, and, in that context, our silence speaks volumes.
A case now before the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals, Mahmoud v. McKnight, illustrates the necessary resolve. In 2022, the Montgomery County Board of Education approved multiple new “inclusivity” books for pre-K to 8th grade curriculums. As you might expect by now, the books celebrated gender-transitioning and drag queens, taught about deviant sexual orientations, like “non-binary,” and about all kinds of LGBTQ+ symbols, like the intersex flag. They, of course, also, and perhaps more importantly, seek to silence anyone who may question these ideas as hateful and hurtful.
Now, listen up, parent. At first, the school board swore that parents would be notified when the books would be read to children so they could opt out of the lessons. That is how they got the books accepted in the first place. Never be deceived by these tactics. A demand that age-appropriate material be presented to children, that religious beliefs be respected, and that children are not sexualized and their minds perverted are not unreasonable demands. Do not allow that material in your child’s classroom as long as you can “opt out.”
Because, of course, it never stays that way. In 2023, the school board changed its policy and decided to notify parents no longer. Neither would they honor their request to opt out their children.
Thankfully, many parents of diverse backgrounds, including Muslims, Catholics, and Protestants, got together to fight back. With the help of attorneys at Becket, they filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for Maryland to protect their parental rights to direct the religious upbringing of their children.
Any reasonable person can see that teachings around family and human sexuality are at the heart of religious devotion, so it should have been an easy case for the court to vindicate parents. But, believe it or not, the court ruled parents cannot opt out of the radical, quasi-religious LGBTQ+ indoctrination lessons in these schools. Judge Deborah L. Boardman praised the benefits of these sorts of curriculums, saying they “foster social integration and cultural inclusiveness of transgender and gender nonconforming students.”
Despite the obvious, Judge Boardman justified her immoral ruling by stating that the policy “does not pressure the parents to refrain from teaching their faiths.” They will indoctrinate our children with all kinds of perversions all day at school, and it is okay because you get to talk to them about it for a couple of hours at night. The fact that you rightly believe a five-year-old is not old enough to consider changing his sex is not persuasive to them.
The parents have now appealed to the Fourth Circuit. Let us pray for those proceedings.
Now, what would you say if you had to guess which president appointed Judge Boardman? If you guessed, the same president who is aggressively pushing for men in women’s sports and for the redefinition of “sex” to include “sexual orientation” and “gender identity” in all of federal law, who supports the transitioning of children despite the scientific data, President Joe Biden, you would be correct.
I say that to help you understand that this is an ideology with all the impetus of a false religion that runs deep within today’s liberal ideology, and we must be ready to battle against it at that level. It is not one rogue person, district, elected official, or judge. It is pervasive. They will not stop. It will get worse. They will push for more and more territory.
Parents must rise against it. Not only to stop them from gaining more ground but to push them back away from the ground they have already conquered around our children.
This is a hill worth dying on.