Posted on 12/30/2011 5:01:11 PM PST by TheDon
A Christian parenting book has come under fire after the deaths of three children from abuse. The families are reported to have been following the guidance of the book "To Train Up a Child" by Michael and Debi Pearl.
The "Today" show reports:
Hana Williams, 13, died of hypothermia after allegedly being starved, abused and locked outside by her parents. Lydia Schatz, age 7, died after being repeatedly beaten by her parents. And 4-year-old Sean Paddock suffocated after his mother wrapped him in a blanket too tightly in an effort to keep him from getting out of bed.
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(Excerpt) Read more at latimesblogs.latimes.com ...
Having never read the book myself I can only say this.
Yes it did only in that the parents did not understand what they were reading or did not have the ability to translate the knowledge they received. This does not mean the book is totally at fault but it is the catalyst.
In other words it would have been best they had never read it.
Agreed. Sounds like the opposite of christianity to me! Extremely bad parenting.
This is an old line Amish book, quite different than Catholic, Evangelical and mainline Protestant approaches.
I haven’t read it either, but I can’t imagine it in any way that it promotes the behaviors exhibited by these “parents”.
Ooops! I was confused with a different book by the same title... sorry.
I’ve read the book ... and then threw it away instead into the library-sale been, so I wouldn’t be responsible for someone else’s reading it.
Nonetheless, although I think the authors are profoundly in error about many things, the failure of the parents mentioned in the article to use common sense is not the fault of the authors.
Debi Pearl’s book for wives, Created to be his helpmeet, has some equally screwy advice. A friend of mine who is/was a Christian counselor told me that a lot of her clients have needed her help after reading that book.
Nice tagline. Now if we can just get a decent candidate that can win. If there ever was a time for a true conservative candidate to win big this is it! There has not been such a good opportunity since the 1980 presidential election.
Where is our next Ronald Reagan when you need him?
My mother was the queen of creative attitude adjustment but we were never abused. On the other hand, a lot of the daily chores I had would probably be seen as abuse by today’s “experts”.
So is there any truth to this article? Is the book that bad? I had never heard of it until the first of these articles were posted here.
The parents should have had common sense? You expect too much in this day and age! :)
That bad? Sounds like Dr. Spock had a better book than this!
Some folks take an idea and carry it to wacky extremes or become overly literal about it and lose metaphorical meanings. It is difficult to believe the authors of the book wanted this.
What a stupid article. The book’s authors should sue the article’s author for totally misrepresenting the book.
I was skeptical too, although some mainstream works take a more authoritarian/punitive bent than others (like some of the very early Dobson books, now revised). But it looks like this one really IS in a serious contest with Spock for screwey, except from the other side.
I actually read the book and applied the very commonsense principles. Very sound advice about scheduling children for eating and sleeping. My household had happy and well rested children who were a joy to be around My kids are now teens but I still see how the simple principle of consistency still bears fruit
That never happens in the US whether the criticism of the work is totally on target or grossly wrong. That pesky First Amendment, ya know. You can libel a person. You can’t libel a book — that’s not defined in law.
Don't be naive. You icky Christians are evil. /sarcasm. LOL!
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