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It's Friday, October 24, 2025. I'm Albert Mohler, and this is the Briefing, a daily analysis of news and events from a Christian worldview. Parenting advice. The world seems to be filled with it. Bookstores are frankly offering dozens and dozens of new titles a year, coming from publishers on advice for parents when it comes to raising children. Where did all of this come from? Well, Peter and Bridgette Berger years ago wrote a book entitled the War on the Family, in which they said that one of the symptoms of the modern age is that a family, and in particular, parents, the mother and the father, are surrounded by what the Bergers described as a regime of experts, supposed experts, who are speaking into family life and defining family. Now, that's a fascinating concept, and I think the Burgers were absolutely right. But it also forces us to just think for a moment about where this avalanche of advice for parents came from and why. Well, when it comes to just say how most parents came to be parents and to learn how to do parenting, they learned in the context of homes and neighborhoods and churches. There wasn't so much this entire universe of professionals and experts speaking into parenting that began to change in the Victorian era. And so we're talking in the early modern age. In the Victorian era, all of a sudden, in the age of widespread print cult, you had magazines for moms and magazines about the family and magazines and books that were written giving advice to parents. And that really exploded with the therapeutic revolution of the 20th century. At that point, you had the rise of not only the pediatric discipline as a specialization among physicians, but you also had the regime of experts that came in, psychologists, child psychologists, sociologists, the entire therapeutic universe, educators. They all came saying that they knew what was best for children. And of course, one of the things you have to note is that there have been wave after wave. All of these waves have come with this theory and then that theory, this approach, and then that approach. The main worldview divide, by the way, is between a biblical Christian understanding of the family, parenthood, as explained in terms of that biblical worldview, and a secular perspective on parenting, which, frankly, has been one of the most unstable in entities as a conceptual unit in all of the modern age. But if you try to come up with a parenting approach that is separate from that that would be offered by historic Christianity, informed by Scripture, something that would be alienated from the scriptural position and understanding and taken out of the nurturing context of extended family and also of the congregation, then you're just going to fall to fad after fad. And that's exactly, by the way, an entire publishing industry, but also an entire therapeutic industry just thrives off of and expands and makes money off of this parenting theory. And then the next. Well, USA Today, which is a barometer of these cultural developments, just in recent days ran an article asking what are Velcro parents and how to avoid the pitfalls. Madeline Mitchell is the reporter on this case. And Madeline Mitchell is telling us about a new phenomenon when it comes to raising children. These are children described as Velcro kids. Why are they described that way? It is because they stick to their parents like, well, the two sides of Velcro. The article begins, I kid you not, with one father's experience. And as USA Today tells us that his, quote, 5 year old wants to be near him all the time, whether he's in the kitchen, backyard or even in the bathroom. We are then told that this particular father told his TikTok followers in a post about Velcro kids. We're told that his post garnered nearly 3 million views. Thousands of comments, many from parents experiencing what we're told is the same thing. The term stems from Velcro babies, which therapist Elizabeth Shane describes as infants who prefer constant contact and cry when they are put down. One commentator said, quote, my kids sit outside the bathroom and ask me questions, end quote. Now, number one, you just have to wonder where these people come from. And let's just be honest, anyone who's ever raised kids knows that the children of the species Homo sapiens are all Velcro kids, every single one of them. And even though previous generations of parents would have no idea what Velcro was, they would understand the phenomenon. That is to say that by a Christian biblical understanding, we know that a human infant grows craves connection to his or her parents and that bonding process. And yes, they want the parents attention. Now the interesting thing here is that you have USA Today reporting on this phenomenon that appeared at TikTok, but also has the background of a therapist who's been writing about these Velcro kids. This tells us that all of a sudden there's some parents who understand that kids are, I don't know, kids, that infants are infants, toddlers are toddlers, and the demands are very, very substantial. These kids make demands on their parents. They will sit outside in the hallway because they're absent from the parents for just a few minutes or seconds. But I don't think this is a new human experience. Now it may have been just a bit different for Abraham and Sarah. There wasn't a hallway But I think the situation was probably hauntingly familiar. The reporter here tells us, quote, the term Velcro parents isn't as established as other parenting styles. But she says, referring to some of those parenting styles such as lawnmower parents, helicopter parents, intensive parents, gentle parents, free range parents, she says, quote, it is gaining traction on social media. While it can feel good to know you've created a safe space and a close bond with your child, experts say it's important for parents to set boundaries and take breaks for themselves too. End quote. Now, let me just be honest. Parenting is a, is a high stress activity. It's, it's a very high demand activity, which is one of the reasons why God intended for this activity to take so much of a human adult's time and investment, particularly a mother in the house, but of both parents, children are very demanding in terms of time and attention. Now, this doesn't mention how rewarding they are, how fulfilling they are, how exhilarating they are. But there wouldn't be a good article at USA Today about how exhilarating being a parent is. So instead, it's about the arduous task of trying to figure out between the styles of lawnmower parents, helicopter parents, intensive parents, gentle parents, free range parents, what kind of parents you should be. And of course, if you're looking for the latest fad, it's going to be one thing after another. We're also told, by the way, that millennial parents are doing things differently. Now, just listen to this. It's written as if we're to take this at face value. Parents these days are spending more quality time with their kids. That's quoting the expert here. And trying to connect with their children instead of, quote, just physically being there. End quote. This theorist again. And the name of the theorist, Elizabeth Shane, she said, and I quote, the overstimulation is real. It's something that most parents go through because we're tired, we don't get a break, we don't get a chance for ourselves. But the reward is the best possible childhood for our children. Just think about all this and you recognize this has to come down to a great deal of nonsense. But you know, if you're thrown into a secular context and all you have is secular wisdom, this is an indication of just how fragile, how temporary, how faddish, and frankly, how empty headed it can be. And so, first of all, I don't know how in the world you would say that this generation of parents is committed to spending more quality time with their children. Isn't that what they said about the last generation of parents and then the generation before that. This is the kind of thing that makes for an article at USA Today. It's not for what makes for much common sense. And it is not very helpful to actual parents who are about the task of parenting. They're going to need more stable advice than this. They don't need a fad. They need good biblical counsel responding to at least one of these fads. I found an article at the New Yorker interesting. It's by Susanna Wolf. And let me just warn you ahead of time, she's making fun of this, so don't have a heart attack. It's entitled, quote, we're doing child led parenting. Okay? Do you understand that the New Yorkers on the cultural left and even on the cultural left, evidently they understand that child led parenting is something to be lampooned rather than exercise. Susanna Wolf writes, quote, oh, you're doing baby led weaning. We did that too. It's really the only way to raise confident, independent little humans. That's why we decided to take it a step further and do child led parenting. Hold on one sec. Yes, Caleb, my love, how can I help your journey? I see. Yes, I understand that your heart wants to watch Paw Patrol right now, but remember, you broke your iPad. So, okay, yes, you can watch on my iPad. Great problem solving. Okay, she's lampooning this. Here's what she says. She says, we started with gentle parenting, but we found that we were having difficulty maintaining boundaries. And then Derek, presumably her husband, and I realized that we're smart, capable people and there's no reason to believe that our son isn't just as smart and capable. So we stopped enforcing boundaries. Instead, we said, caleb is the one who needs to be parented. He should be in charge of deciding how it's done. Now remember, Caleb is the young child, okay? Now speaking to the child, she says, and you know what, Caleb, my darling, I'm reflecting on our previous interaction and I fear that my saying you broke your iPad was really blame forward phrasing and might cause you feelings of shame or guilt. No, you're not feeling that. Well, just to be safe, I want to revise my words so they carry less accusation. How's this? Your iPad became broken while in your possession. That's better, right? Yeah, you can keep watching Paw Patrol. Okay, she's making fun of this, but the point is, she couldn't make fun of it if the average reader of the New Yorker didn't know exactly what she's talking about and in all likelihood wasn't at some level attracted to this idea of baby led weaning, which leads, as she says here, to child led parenting, which is of course an oxymoron. And that's the point. But I can almost guarantee you that if someone came up with this and packaged it as a new theory of how to raise children, it just might become a new New York Times bestseller and needless to say, probably an entire series in USA Today. But behind my raising of these issues today is not just pointing to the insanity we see here, but reminding Christian parents that we really do have a distinctive understanding of parenting of the family, of the child, based in scripture, not based in the latest psychological or therapeutic fad. And thus a biblically guided approach to parenting and raising our children is fundamentally different than the wisdom of the world. It started out that way. It is that way today. No one should be surprised. All right, now let's turn to questions. And as always, I'm really interested in the questions sent and honored by them. You can send your question just by writing me@mailbertmuller.com I'm going to take the first question from an 18 year old young man and he writes in about college. He makes some very kind statements, which I greatly appreciate. Then he says, quote, I'm a young man who's looking at going to college. I was wondering what your thoughts were on Charlie Kirk's views on college as a man so experienced in the world of academia. He's speaking in my role as president of the college in the seminary. He says, what do you think about Mr. Kirk's remarks that college is a scam? He says, I am particularly concerned by the cost. He says that he got a job when he was 16. He has saved some money for college. Quote, now I'm wondering if the money would be better spent elsewhere because that money wouldn't even cover the cost of one year. Is college worth going into debt for? Okay, lots of questions there. Good questions. And, and I really want to honor those questions coming from an 18 year old young man. And let me just come back and say that Charlie Kirk's views on college weren't exactly one thing. And so he raised a lot of good questions. And as a matter of fact, he did not go to college. And clearly Charlie Kirk was a success. But let's also face it and say Charlie Kirk was a success because God gave him many gifts and he used those gifts beginning at a very young age. But I think at the same time, even as Charlie Kirk wrote a book and clearly raised questions about the current practice of higher education in America. And I share just about all of his concerns, the quite legitimate concerns. The fact is that Charlie Kirk spent a great deal of his time on college and university campuses, and especially trying to reach out to college and university students. And he didn't say exactly this when he was on those campuses. And I think it's because he did recognize that. I won't say the vast majority. It's really hard to quantify this. But I would say that success in.