God designed the human body and soul to keep us safe and healthy. Unfortunately, most people these days don’t believe in or seek the power of the inner spirit. Instead, we desire instant solutions. We look for doctors to cure us, police to protect us, public teachers to raise our children, and the government to help pay our bills. No doubt, politicians have distracted us from God’s plan for our lives.
Without insight, it is easy to look to famous people for guidance. But unfortunately, politicians, movie stars, TV personalities, rappers, and the internet can lead impressionable minds to self-destructive behavior, including sex, drugs, and violence.
I grew up in a broken home with an alcoholic father who abused my brother. After my parents’ divorce, my mother and her boyfriend abandoned me in Mexico City at age 15. I didn’t even speak Spanish. That experience almost killed me. Lacking any help, I turned to God and survived. My life’s mission changed.
Years later, as a young mother, I got involved in my community with 16,500 residents and discovered we had a crime wave. A small, devoted group of citizens worked together to address the issue of crime. As a result, we got neighbors to take responsibility for their own neighborhood safety, and crime reduced by 50% within two and a half years without a local police department. This accomplishment opened many doors to work with police and citizen groups. During this time, I began to understand the power of involved people to uplift families, neighborhoods, and communities. It became apparent that big government was moving in the wrong direction.
Big government overreach ignores strengthening American families and neighborhoods to address root causes.
- Government employees take children out of homes and put them in foster care or a group home. I witnessed children given four to six drugs a day to calm them. One 16-year-old told me, “I am so foggy I can’t think straight.” Another child said a caseworker sexually abused her.
- Public schools are bypassing parents and teaching sex education to young children. We must promote involving families to protect children.
- I worked with the homeless in San Francisco and witnessed the government passing out needles and money to drug addicts. We started support groups, and men got jobs.
- A police officer once pushed me into a wall. Why? Because I was helping low-income residents take charge of their homes and neighborhood safety.
- The government has warehoused low-income families in high-rise buildings for decades. As a result, parents couldn’t monitor their children’s safety. Without parental supervision, drugs, child abuse, gangs, and sex trafficking became commonplace in many low-income settings.
- The government intentionally allowed over two million illegals to enter the United States in 2021. With no monitoring, fentanyl and other drugs are flooding America. As a result, over 100,000 Americans died in 2021.
- Crime in our major cities is up 30%. This crime figure is twenty times worse than in the 1960s when families worshiped together.
We live at a time when the government has deprived people, especially children, of the magic and blessings of life! It’s time for concerned Americans to speak up and take back our God-given values. Let’s get back to “In God We Trust” to keep families safe. “Ask, and you shall receive!” John 16:24.
Everyone has the power to experience the magic of the human spirit, which can keep you, your family, and your community safe and healthy.
Stephanie L. Mann, Crime and Violence Prevention Consultant
Author of five books on the family, neighborhood, and community safety
www.safekidsnow.com
