Why our founding family values prohibit spanking and punishment of children

Many parents think that attachment parenting will erase traditions and religion in this country. Children's rights advocates talk a good game about banning religion or making it a taboo, but chances are, our religious traditions are here to stay, minus the spanking tradition.

We are a nation of values. We are a Christian nation, founded on Judeo-Christian family values. The Bible is America's book, and the source for all of our wisdom and norms as a country. Denominations may differ as to how to interpret the Good Book, but there is a right answer, and that right answer prohibits spanking.

Parents are to prioritize their children first, and themselves last, to the point of complete dutiful and selfless submission to the every need of their child, expecting absolutely nothing in return, with children resting in the love and grace of parents. See Colossians 3:20-21 KJV:

Children, obey your parents in all things: for this is well pleasing unto the Lord. Fathers, provoke not your children to anger, lest they be discouraged.

The Greek root word translated "obey" is υπακουο (Latin: hupakouo) and refers to secure, vulnerable rest in the love and grace of parents. Attachment parenting was the norm in biblical times, including the Early Christian context. Think a mother holding pales of water, with a young child wrapped up next to her bosom in swaddling blankets, and an older child in the nude running close alongside the mother. That is how parenting was done in biblical times. The modern equivalent? A mother holding her crying toddler to her bosom, with the toddler wrapped with swaddling blankets fresh from the dryer, with an older child, with just a shirt on, held close in her mother's hand, confiding into her about how hard school was.

The Greek root word translated "provoke...to anger" is ερεθιζο (Latin: erethizo) and refers to the slightest of offense perceived by the child, including the slightest of unwanted touch or contact perceived by a child. This commandment was intended by the Apostle Paul and the surrounding legal context as prohibiting any form of punishment and control in parenting, deeming it as a grand provocation to anger, meaning kidnapping. Paul here was admonishing Greek Christians who misused the "rod verses" in Proverbs to justify their pagan custom of spanking children, whereas all seven verses of Proverbs that mention the rod are repealed verses that mention a dated legal punishment towards ADULT children - the 40 minus 1 lashes with the rod of correction. Think "Department of Corrections" for what being whipped with the rod meant then for a young adult. Spanking children does not come from the Bible, but was a pagan custom to "purify" them of all "impurity" and "unchasteness" and was part of the rituals of the Greco-Roman pagan religions, especially the Hellenistic religion. In ancient Hebrew and Christian traditions, two siblings who were getting too close to each other in terms of experimentation were kept apart, and were supervised while kept apart. Much of play for older children was vaguely sexually themed, usually in terms of attractiveness to parents and siblings.

America is on the path to a spanking ban, particularly in states such as here in Pennsylvania. The idea is to gain as much support as possible, on a grassroots level, in order to campaign for a spanking ban. Expect bans in religious institutions first. As of now, the Seventh-day Adventist churches and the Jehovah's Witnesses do not have a stance on the spanking issue, meaning you can be an attachment parenting in such churches, as long as it is kept quiet and campaigned for only outside of the church. Being one of ours is already allowed in fundamentalist denominations, but trying to convert other congregants to our parenting is banned still. Most churches are neutral on the spanking issue these days, but the question remains HOW neutral a church entity is. Some churches have anti-spanking statements. America's anti-spanking transformation will most likely work within denominational boundaries, reforming from within and from without in churches. Anti-spanking laws will only be passed as per popular demand, meaning the more support we have, the more states will ban spanking. The core of the opposition is religious in nature, but few people know that the core of the support can be religious in nature as well.

We are a Christian country, and the Bible is one of our founding documents, with the Judeo-Christian tradition being attachment parenting. We are learning about our founding values, and amending them as we learn more about who we are as Americans. Nowhere in our nation's founding values does it say to exclude a group of people just because they are under a certain magic age. Children's opinions and grievances matter, and thus society should be welcoming of that. Attachment parenting is a biblically commanded and time-honored way of relating to children, meaning being their friend, but a more responsible friend that is a shoulder to lean on, or shout into.

The depraved and entitled parents will not inherit the Kingdom of God! Let them burn in the lake of fire and burning sulfur, which is the second death prepared for Satan and his accomplices, meaning the devil's tomb! Repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand!