Tuesday, December 2, 2008

Christian Berenstain Bears

Berenstain Bears Via Emily , the beloved Berenstain Bears of our youth are promoting wholesome Christian values on the Focus on the Family website. While many might be horrified at these beloved childhood books endorsing the right-wing, anti-gay agenda of James Dobson 's organization, I don't exactly remember the original books being secular. The new Dobson-sponsored religious versions are authored by Stan & Jan Berenstain, the same authors of the original books. Stan has now passed away, but his son Mike continues to author books with his mother.

Let's remember that the Berenstain books focused on morality tales and holidays that were obviously Christian in origin. It's fairly common, especially in the days before we were young, to weave Christianity in with children's literature. But in addition to the Berenstain Bears, let's remember that there are plenty of other progressive children's books out there: Heather Has Two Mommies , All Families are Special , and the ultra-feminist Paper Bag Princess .

While it's a little concerning that Dobson's organization is working on indoctrination at such a young age, there's plenty of indoctrination that progressives can do as well. It's important to realize that there's a huge slection of children's books out there, so there's no need to rush to the Focus on the Family website to order the books of the churchgoing Berenstain Bears.

Cross posted at Pushback.

1 comment:

Mike Berenstain said...

The Focus on the Family Catalog is selling this Berenstain Bears book series but it did not sponsor or support it. The series is published by Zondervan, the religious division of HarperCollins which is the publisher of the Berenstain Bears main line of secular books. Dobson's organization is simply a customer of Zondervan.

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