The Good News Club Curriculum: An Overview

Other posts on this blog–see here and here and here–have discussed the dark gospel of Child Evangelism Fellowship’s Good News Club.  This post reviews troubling content from a much wider sample of CEF’s Good News Club curriculum.

Overview

The Club’s curriculum is a 5-year-long series of weekly Bible  stories—about 120 in all—most of which are drawn from the Biblical books and/or characters of Genesis, Jesus, Paul, Moses, King David, Daniel, Joseph,  Joshua, Esther, Elisha, Elijah, and Judges. Each 60-90 minute lesson is interwoven with presentations of the “Gospel” according to the so-called  “Wordless Book.” The “Wordless Book” refers to the colors gold, black, red, white, and green, which respectively symbolize heaven, the child’s sin nature, Jesus’s shed blood, righteousness, and growth. Each Bible story is divided into sections; and in between each section, the lesson draws a parallel between the preceding section of the Bible story and one of the “Wordless Book” themes. Most lessons also feature didactic exercises, memory verse quizzes, songs, games and prizes, all designed to reinforce the lesson themes.

This post discusses the contents of the 21 lesson books of the Club’s  2006-2011 curriculum cycle.[1]  The Club’s current curriculum cycle includes 18 of the same lesson books.[2]

Shame indoctrination

The Club’s dominant theme is sin. Its 5-year curriculum includes over 5000 references to sin, compared to less than 2000 references to “love.” Spread over 120 one-hour lessons, a child can expect to hear a reference to “sin” approximately every 90 seconds.

Each lesson uses a black heart to vividly symbolize a child’s inner self.  The black heart impresses children with a deeply personal sense of their own inadequacy and sordidness. “You were born with darkness in your heart because of  sin,” says one lesson on blind Bartimaeus.[3] “Your heart (the real you) is sinful from the time you are born,” exclaims a lesson on the golden calf.[4]

The Club frequently reminds children that they are “deceitful,” “dishonest,” and “desperately wicked.”[5] A lesson on Cain and Abel warns: “your heart is very sinful…. You may think you’re pretty good, but when God sees your heart He sees it is full of sin.”[6] Another lesson on Jacob and Esau declares: “Others may think that you are a good person, but God knows what you’re really like on the inside. He knows that deep down you are a sinner—you were born that way.”[7] “God says none of us are good,” explains a lesson on God’s omniscience.[8] Even the concept of redemption is used to deprecate children. “As Jesus hung on the cross, God punished him for your sin and your deceitful heart.”[9]

Guidelines for Drafting a Facility Use Policy

Intrinsic Dignity has released detailed guidelines for drafting a facility use policy to protect elementary public school students from emotional and psychological abuse from outside groups.  The guidelines accompany a comprehensive article that surveys public forum, equal access, and religion clause caselaw relevant to religious clubs and uses in public elementary schools.  Here’s the title of the abstract, entitled “Protecting Public Elementary School Children from Emotional and Psychological Harm By Outside Groups”:

In 2001, the Supreme Court gave the Good News Club equal access to Milford Central School to teach elementary students after-school religious “moral and character” lessons. Today, there are over 4,000 Good News Clubs in America’s public schools, telling 5-12 year-olds that they are sinful from birth, deserve to die and go to Hell, to not become close friends with their non-Christian classmates, and to be afraid of thoughts, beliefs and scientific facts that displease God. Can schools do anything to stop it?

Yes and no. Public schools cannot deny equal access to groups merely because they are religious. But the principle of neutrality works both ways. Religious groups must play by the same rules—including not harming children—as any other group. Schools can—through the careful drafting and application of religiously neutral policies—act to protect the psychological, emotional, and intellectual well-being of their elementary schoolchildren.

To plot the legal authority guiding public school regulation of after-class forums, this article surveys caselaw on public forums, student speech, other special categories of speech, church autonomy, and equal access statutes. This article also provides guidelines for drafting a child-protective facility use policy and proposes a model facility use policy.

Also check out Intrinsic Dignity’s redesigned website.

CEF drops “Hell” from its online Wordless Book presentation

My most compelling motivation in bringing public scrutiny to bear on the severity of Child Evangelism Fellowship’s (CEF’s) curriculum is to prompt CEF to make changes to that curriculum. It affects millions of children every year. I suffered as a child from its harshness. I wish for other children to be spared.  Children deserve to be loved, cherished, and nurtured.  They don’t deserve to be shamed and despised and belittled.  They deserve to live.  They do not — as CEF’s curriculum appallingly states — “deserve to die.”

Now — at last! — there is a small hint of “good news.” This month, CEF –for the first time — dropped the word “Hell” from its online Wordless Book presentation. The appropriately titled “Gospel Dark” page previously looked like this:

“[T]he punishment for sin is to be separated from God forever in a place of suffering…a place called Hell.”

This month, CEF dropped the words “in a place of suffering…a place called Hell” from the “gospel dark” script.  This is an incremental improvement in a still stunningly negative script:

No more explicit Hell. Hell is now implicit.

Of course, CEF has much, much more to do, including a complete soul-searching reexamination of the reductionist salvation-as-a-formula, punitive & self-abasing theology behind the “Wordless Book.” It is time for the broader evangelical community to reexamine — and ultimately challenge — the same theology.

Some will mock this minor edit.  But I applaud it, small though it may be.

Standing up for children & uniting against religious child abuse

On Saturday, March 9, about 40 concerned citizens gathered at a peaceful protest of the abusive shame and fear indoctrination of Child Evangelism Fellowship. The event was a “Good News Spectacular” at the Dixie Classic Fairgrounds in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.  The protest was covered by the local newspaper, Winston-Salem Journal, and Fox 8 WGHP.

Protecting Children

The Supreme Court’s 2001 Good News Club v. Milford Central School opinion is a widely misunderstood decision. In Milford, the Supreme Court held that Milford Central School could not exclude the Good News Club, an evangelical Bible lesson program aimed at children ages 5-12, merely because of its religious nature.

The Milford decision turned on a pivotal question of whether the Good News Club could be excluded solely because of its religious content. The Supreme Court held that it could not. To exclude the Good News Club merely because of its religious content, while admitting other superficially similar groups (e.g., groups promoting “character” development), constituted viewpoint discrimination.

But the Good News Club could have been — and still can be — excluded on viewpoint-neutral grounds crafted to protect children from harm.

Jefferson Lighthouse School (Racine, WI)

In Muller v. Jefferson Lighthouse School, 98 F.3d 1530 (7th Cir. 1996), Andrew Muller – a 4th grader – asked his teachers for permission to hand out invitations to an AWANA program at his church. The School refused because it violated the Code of Student Responsibilities and Rights. Among other things, the Code included provisions allowing a principal to bar from distribution literature that was “obscene” or “insulting to any group or individuals.” Id. at 1534 n.4.

Muller’s parents sued and challenged the “insulting” aspect – and many others – of the Code. While agreeing that the School improperly applied the Code to exclude the flyer for no other reason than that it was religious, the 7th Circuit rejected Muller’s facial challenge:

Declaring the elementary school classroom, hallway or playground forums for unfettered student communication would require either a severe incursion into the critical educational mission of the elementary school or a substantial contraction of the First Amendment protections afforded speech in a public forum. In a public forum, the Christian can tell the Jew he is going to hell, or the Jew can tell the Christian he is not one of God’s chosen, no matter how that may hurt. But it makes no sense to say that the overly zealous Christian or Jewish child in an elementary school can say the same thing to his classmate, no matter the impact. Racist and other hateful views can be expressed in a public forum. But an elementary school under its custodial responsibilities may restrict such speech that could crush a child’s sense of self-worth.

Id. at 1540. The 7th Circuit also remarked that:

• A “public elementary school can shield its five through thirteen-year-olds from topics and viewpoints that could harm their emotional, moral, social, and intellectual development.” Id. at 1538.

• Schools can intercept “racially and religiously bigoted materials … before they damage children and the environment.” Id. at 1541.

• “[T]here is no practical way to protect students from materials that can … severely traumatize a child without some form of prior restraint.” Id.

• “Schools … are free to screen student handouts for material that is insulting or lewd or otherwise inconsistent with legitimate pedagogical concerns.” Id. at 1542.

• “[A] school need not tolerate student expression of viewpoints which are fundamentally ‘inconsistent with its basic educational mission.’” Id. (citation omitted).

As documented in www.goodnewsclubs.info website, the Good News Club violates all of these standards. It shames, terrorizes, and traumatizes children with messages such as “you deserve death [and Hell].” It glorifies genocide and stigmatizes nonbelievers as persons who “refuse to believe God” and who deserve to be punished for their defiant disbelief. It attacks evolution and suggests that those who teach it are serving Satan.

Why didn’t any of these rationales come up in Milford? And why hasn’t this rationale come up in any of the scores of GNC cases that Child Evangelism Fellowship (CEF) has litigated since Milford? For two reasons. First, schools have repeatedly attempted to exclude the Good News Club merely because it is religious. Second, no school district has ever taken a close look at the Good News Club curriculum. It’s time for that to change. It’s time to hold CEF accountable for violating basic standards of decency.

A Model Facilities Use Policy

Intrinsic Dignity is pleased to announce that is has released a Model Facility Use Policy to protect children from harmful outside organizations.  Print out a copy and send it to the your school board members and administrators!

Intrinsic Dignity Inc.

Intrinsic Dignity’s logo

If you care about faith-based harm suffered by children, help Intrinsic Dignity.

Join Intrinsic Dignity, make a contribution to Intrinsic Dignity, or do both.

Intrinsic Dignity is an emerging grassroots organization whose mission is to raise awareness of, mitigate, and prevent harm and cruelty to children that is rooted in misguided religious practices and beliefs. Children have a right to develop in conditions of freedom, open inquiry, and empathy, and in respect of their inherent dignity and equality. Children also have a right to resources that will help equip them to become thriving independent adults.

Denver area school districts

Intrinsic Dignity’s opening project is challenging the severe pedagogy of Child Evangelism Fellowship and its Good News Club.  This is exhibited in the extensive recently launched website Good News Club: A Critique and related awareness-raising efforts.  In the coming months, Intrinsic Dignity will focus its attention on Denver, Colorado, as we prepare to meet Child Evangelism Fellowship’s 2013 “summer blitz” with concerned and coordinated opposition.

As Intrinsic Dignity’s efforts to challenge the shame and fear indoctrination of the Good News Club gain traction, Intrinsic Dignity plans to expand into additional focus areas. These include movements and organizations that promote harsh, punitive, and degrading treatment of children, excessively shelter children from integration with the broader community, and hinder children from becoming independent, educated, and equipped to thrive as adults.

Good News Club Website

Today I am excited to announce the website http://www.goodnewsclubs.info.  This website — the product of several months of intensive research and preparation — provides the public, especially parents of public school elementary children, with information about the “dark side” of Child Evangelism Fellowship’s Good News Club.  The introductory page is especially interesting.  Click on any of the five thumbnails to the right of the introductory page to read excerpts of other authors describing their own childhood experiences at the Good News Club.

The “Gospel” section of the goodnewsclubs.info website cites dozens of invectives of sin and hell in the Good News Club curriculum, unleashed in a torrential assault of shame and terror on children in an effort to convert them to Christianity.

The “Curriculum” section of the goodnewsclubs.info website provides an overview of Good News Club’s entire 5-year curriculum, and will — over time — include summaries of each of the approximately 120 lessons in the curriculum.  24 leson reviews have been completed so far.  Currently, there are completed lesson reviews for each of the 12 lessons in the “Elijah” and “Elisha” series, being taught in U.S. Good News Clubs this fall (Fall 2012), and each of the 12 lessons in the “First Christians” and “David: A Man After God’s Heart” series, being taught in international Good News Clubs this fall.  This will enable parents to read excerpts of the sin-and-shame and turn-or-burn indoctrination systematically incorporated into these Bible stories.

The “History” and “Public School” sections of the goodnewsclubs.info website provide interesting historical information about the Good News Club and Child Evangelism Fellowship and its recent rapid transition from private neighborhood homes into public schools.

The “Legal Issues” section of the goodnewsclubs.info website is very interesting and very important.  The “Equal Access” page summarizes the Supreme Court’s landmark Good News Club v. Milford decision.  Subsequent pages discuss the definition and applicability of “child abuse” under the Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act, the definition and applicability of “bullying” under recent anti-bullying legislation and policies, and the relevance of the United Nations’ 1959 Declaration on the Rights of the Child and more recent Convention on the Rights of the Child.  The “Facility Use Policy” page suggests religiously neutral changes that can be made to public school facility use policies to protect children from emotionally and psychologically abusive clubs.  Finally, the “Civil Remedies” section discusses the applicability of the First Amendment’s Free Speech and Religion Clauses to claims for emotional harm or distress arising from Good News Club’s activities.

The Dark Gospel Message of the Good News Club

It’s been well over a year since my last post.  Two years ago, I began focusing on the authoritarian emphasis and shame-inducing content of a handful of Good News Club lessons, some of them dating back to the late 1960s.  I suspended those efforts until now because of the personal trauma they triggered.

Now, I’m back.  Recently, I purchased from CEF Press what was available of the entire Good News Club curriculum.  After scanning and OCR’ing the curriculum, I undertook a thorough analysis of it.  A portion of that analysis is incorporated into a new mini-documentary Youtube video, above, that I created on “The Dark Gospel Message of the Good News Club.”

The Good News Club curriculum cycle spans five years.  The most recent cycle comprised 21 lesson books, including 123 lessons.  The cumulative word count of those GNC materials — some 760,000 words — nearly matches that of the King James Version of the Bible.

The Bible itself has a very strong authoritarian, obedience-focused and sin-obsessed bent.  But the Good News Club materials has an even darker emphasis, including nearly 5000 references to sin, over 1000 references to obedience, 930 references to punishment, and 300 allusions to, or direct mentions of, hell.

Child Evangelism Fellowship on Genocide

The animation below faithfully illustrates another one of Child Evangelism Fellowship (CEF)’s favorite Sunday School/Good News Club/Vacation Bible School lessons — “Saul’s Disobedience.” Namely, Saul’s disobedience in failing to finish his genocide of the Amalekites, after God had instructed him to kill everyone, including “children and infants” (1 Samuel 15).

As I wrote a few months ago in “Good News Club” on the Slaughter of the Amalekites, CEF uses this Bible story to emphasize the importance of “total obedience” to God’s purported commands. Even when the commands are troubling and seemingly Nazi-like (like the command to commit genocide) and “we don’t understand them,” the Christian duty is to carry out the commands without hesitation or reservation. As with my previous two animations, the female audio script is genuine — directly excerpted from the 1973 version of CEF’s appallingly authoritarian “Life of David” teaching script:

1 Samuel 15 is a favorite argument (legitimately so) of skeptics of Christianity against the inspiration and authority of the Bible. Most Christian adults know nothing about this story. But many Christian children do. I learned about it at a Good News Club when I was seven years old. This, and many other disturbing lessons like it, are designed to instill authoritarian values (such as “total obedience”) in children.