Rick Green [00:00:07] Welcome to the intersection of faith and culture. Is the WallBuilder show on a Friday, my favorite day of the week, as always. I love hearing all the good news. David and Tim have been collecting throughout the week and we're getting caught, we're starting to get caught up. I mean, a lot of these stories are months old because there's just been so much this year, so many good things, summer seemed to slow down a little bit, but honestly, may just be my own perception because we've been so busy at the campus. I haven't been able to keep up on a lot the news out there, but I know David and 10 were trying to keep. So we're going to throw as much good news as we can at you today. And if you just can't get your fill, go to our website, Wildbuilders.show, click on any of those Friday programs, and you'll get even more good news. So by the way, Rick Green here with David Barton and Tim Barton, and David and Tim, let's jump in. What's our first piece of good news, David? 

David Barton [00:00:51] Well, this one comes from a professor, Brad Wilcox, who's at the university of Virginia. He's a sociology professor there and he has gone over, lots of polling, including new polling that they've done this come in. And he shows that right now in America, good news, the divorce rate is declining and the percentage of children growing up and married two parent homes is on the rise. This is what was called the traditional nuclear family. And since the eighties, divorce rate has been soaring. The number of those that are, that are born in two parent homes has been declining and I think, you know, I think there's probably no group in America that has taken a worse beating on the traditional family than the black family. If you go back in the late 1960s, 92% of black children were born in a two parent home. If you to the last two or three years, it's down to 32%. So what a tremendous destruction of the traditional nuclear family has happened, particularly in that community where you don't have a mother and a father. And, and we know that that is one of the greatest things to overcoming poverty, to having educational achievement, to having job stability is being raised in a home with a mother and a farther. And of course that goes against all the gender nonsense. It's out there that gender doesn't matter. Yes, it does. And the studies are irrefutable in that. And they're more than you can. Can count or even think of. It's just that they've stopped publishing them in recent years as all the wokeness has come through and we're supposed to be all this, whatever anybody wants to be kind of, well, it doesn't all have the same statistical outcome. And so here, this is a new study from again, University of Virginia, which is not what you would necessarily think of as a conservative university, but it doesn' matter. They're putting out the stats. And this came from the Institute for Family Studies there at the University of Regina. And so what's happened is Since the early 1980s, the divorce rate has started falling. So divorce was really going up through the 60s and 70s and the early 80s. It's dropped into the last 15 years. And by the way, the divorced rate has now fallen by about 40% from what it was back in the early eighties. So more and more people getting married, not getting divorced. And most of that has happened in the last fifteen years. So in the 15 years, something's been happening where the people are getting committed to marriage and then that lifelong union. And the second thing that comes as a part of that is more children a day are growing up in a married home than in previous years. So that's the current trend. It's counter for everything we've been hearing for years and years, but it, and it's not a dramatic turnaround. It's a slow, steady turnaround  but it is really, really good to see that turnaround. And then he had this comment. I thought this was really good. He says, it's important for teen boys and young men to hear the entirety of this message. Marriage changes men, but not in nefarious ways. Men work harder, and they find more success at work after they get married. They drink less, and marriage can channel noble characteristics and behaviors that classically have been identified with masculinity. That is the protection, the provision, ambition, and stoicism, and that's good for both men and women, and it can help young men identify and work toward a model of pro-social masculinity. So that's the other thing that's coming out is as a result of traditional marriage, you see traditional masculinity on the rise. And that's another good thing for a culture and society. So really good news in an area I had not expected. I had seen these stats moving this direction in the last 15 years. I just haven't looked at them that much, but I'm really glad he's pointing this out and pointing out the turnarounds are starting to happen. And that is consistent with what we're starting to see in the last five to seven years. On the growing faith among young men and the growing return to family and Bible, et cetera. So this is just really good news for society at large to be moving in a much more stable and traditional kind of direction when it comes to family, which is where your next generation of leaders are gonna come from. And it appears that more and more are coming out of stable homes now, which is great for the future. 

Rick Green [00:05:12] Yeah, I'm right there with you, David. I had not, I hadn't looked at the stats in years, but I didn't feel like it had changed. So this is, I mean, surprising and very good. I mean the, you know, we talk all the time about culture needing to change and the movies and the television programs and how we encourage marriage or tear down marriage and that sort of thing. And so the fact that that trend is going in the right direction when the culture is just now starting to shift. I mean that's a fantastic indicator for us to pay attention to. Very, very good news. All right, Tim. What's your first piece of good news today? 

Tim Barton [00:05:45] All right, guys. Well, this is another win and victory for faith, for people of faith, for religious liberty and freedom. There was a memo that came down from the Trump administration, man, at the end of July, I think is when it was, at least when this article is highlighting it, and it was to alert federal employees that they actually can practice their faith in federal government positions that they don't have to remove and sanitize their workspace, they don't have to sanitize their conversation if they want to talk to people about faith, whatever that might be, Jesus or otherwise, they are free to do that. And it actually even goes on to clarify the US Supreme Court said that the free exercise clause, it protects the not only the right to harbor religious beliefs inwardly but also outwardly. And this is the memo again, coming out from the Trump administration. Now, the fact that you're having to release a memo is probably indicative that this was not necessarily protected to the same extent under the previous administration and maybe, right, not for quite a while. And this one more of those things that as we're tracking so much of what President Trump does, guys, I've said it before. I will repeat this. I think President Trump is one of the most Hebrews 11 like leaders that we have had as a president in America in a long time and Hebrews 11 is as Christians were told our faith Hall of Fame look to the Heroes the faith you've gone before us. Let their lives be examples to us in what's interesting in Hebrews 11. It is a list of incredibly imperfect people that did quite remarkable things under the help anointing and power of God and when people look at President Trump so often they see the imperfections and in their mind that equals a disqualification, and certainly that is not the way God works, that's not the way we have examples in scripture, but what again is so cool is God is using President Trump and his administration, the team he has around him, to promote, to defend and restore religious liberty, religious freedom, and now religious expression in ways that we haven't seen to this extent in our lifetime. So another piece of really good news coming from the federal government. 

Rick Green [00:08:05] Yeah, it's honestly, it hasn't just been a little bit better than what we've seen in the past. It's like a different category of any president that certainly of my lifetime, for sure, even, you know, my favorite, uh, or used to be my favorite Ronald Reagan still in the top five, but Donald Trump definitely pushed him down one slot and moved into that slot. But you know even Reagan's recognitions of God, which were always so stately and you know, respectful. And, and he talked about after the assassination attempt, devoting the rest of his time to whatever God had for him and to God but Trump's is just, I think David, you described it one day is out of the heart, the mouth speaks. And it's just, it's, just so, just, so real. It's just raw. It just, just I don't know something about it. And then the, the prepared statements, which I'm sure, you know, the faith office and others are involved in, they're so powerful. I mean, it, it it's like going to church, man. It's just awesome. Good stuff. Good stuff. All right, David, back to you, brother. What's your next piece of good news? 

David Barton [00:08:57] And I can add to that Trump is not playing around the fringes. He's not using rhetoric that that says you can do this. And I mean, he's just jumping right in the middle of the mud puddle and splashing everywhere. And it's, you know, it's like a kid stomping in the middle and he's doing that and he is laying it out really, really bold. And he does it in that raw way. And then you see the actual written order that comes out, which is very, very powerful, but it is, it is quite amazing to see how upfront he has been. And it's not that the court has changed in recent years, its position on this, because they've held that you can show your faith in public and they've done that for the last 12, 15, 18 years. But it's that Trump is taking that and shoving that at the very top of the stack so that everybody knows it's okay. And instead of being like the library attendant in Russellville, Kentucky that said, hey, you've got a cross on your necklace, you need to take that off because you can't have your faith at the workplace. Trump is saying, hey. Post in your cubicles, post it wherever, talk about it, it's okay. And it has to be okay because you can do that with any other kind of free speech at all, if you want to talk politically, if want to talk about the ball game last weekend. If you want talk about, you know, who's doing well and what series you can do that, you don't treat faith any different from any other conversation. And Trump is, is normalizing faith again, rather than having it be an add-on that we can also do this as well. It's just normal, it's just mainstream and it's really good. So sorry, that was just a comment here and what you guys were talking about. Uh, the, the next one I've got goes to,  another poll that came out recently. And well, actually, I guess the last one we talked about was a survey, not a poll, so this is a poll from Gallup and Gallup does this poll and it is called the social, the general social survey. So this is what Gallup, does to look at social beliefs across the culture. And they do this periodic survey and that's called their, their general social survey. And this one was looking at the positions on pro life type issues. And it's really remarkable for 18 through 29 year olds. So that's the gen y  kind of group, I guess would be in that no, I guess that's Gen Z in it. That'd be Gen Z. Yep. That's a Gen Z group. So the Gen Z Group, it says that, that when they compare the results of the 2025 survey this year or the poll this year to two years ago. Now grab this guys, this is in two years. The percentage of young adults who identify as pro-life increased by eight percentage points. Furthermore, the percentage of young adults who thought abortion should be legal in all circumstances fell by a whopping 14 percentage points, now I'll point you back to the previous presidential election. It was believed that this group of voters would be the one that would decide that America would go pro-abortion. And now this group in the last two years has had a 14% drop in the number of this group who believe that abortion should be legal all the time in all circumstances. And so this is a real big turnaround. And as you look in this poll, it says there's a reason for optimism that this potential gender gap that has been among young adults. It shows a real pro-life turn. And that's really, really good for the future. So that will eventually affect politics. It's going to affect even marriage and what happens within marriage and children, et cetera. It's good news. 

Tim Barton [00:12:29] And I would caveat that it is good news, but that 14% number was those that would support abortion in all circumstances, right? I think that's what you said. 

David Barton [00:12:37]  Yes. 

Tim Barton [00:12:38] And so it does not say that they are now completely against abortion. And I wanna throw this caveat because this is still one of the biggest issues of culture for the rising generation. Even among Christian kids, kids that have been in church to her life, that have gone to Christian school, Christian university, doesn't really matter statistically, percentage-wise. The vast majority of young people, Christians included, Christian young kids right there checking those same boxes. They support some form of abortion because they have so bought into and been brainwashed with the lie that it's, it's for a woman. It's her body. It's your choice. I mean, even right when you had that Texas state rep that was on the Joe Rogan podcast and argued that abortion was a Biblical perspective. This is what so much of the culture is getting. And I'm saying this not to have a caveat for the good news, but to make sure we are informed that this is a battle that we have to be very intentional about engaging for the hearts, the minds, and the souls of the rising generation. Because the rising generations, they're not learning basic biblical truth that, that God formed us and knit us together in our mother's room. Like a Psalm 139, if you just take time with your kids, take time with your grandkids, read Psalm 139 to them, talk to them about what it means, what stands out, what do they notice, and let this be part of the formation of their worldview so they have a biblical perspective of life that God is the author and giver of life, that God has the ones that forms and knits the unborn child together in the mother's womb. It impacts the perspective they will have on abortion because the vast majority of young people have a favorable perspective of abortion. Now, dad, as you mentioned, not in all circumstances because some are now recognizing, you know what? Third trimester, that might be too far. We probably shouldn't do that. Well, that is good news. It's crazy that there's anybody that thinks that's a good decision at all. It's good news that there are fewer people that think it's a decision, but we are still having to recognize this is a battle in culture. We have to be intentional. And so again, for all parents, grandparents, everybody out there, we need to be strategic and make sure we have these conversations. If we don't disciple our kids, the world will. We got to make sure that we disciple them. So we keep making gains in the pro-life movement. 

David Barton [00:14:59] Hey Tim, and the point you made is really good. Just the fact that 14% drop in saying that we don't think abortion should be legal in all circumstances doesn't mean there's a 14-point gain on the pro-life side. As a matter of fact, this poll points out that it's an eight-point gains. So out of the 14% drops in total support for abortion, but that is, in two years, a plus eight on the Pro-Life number of kids who call themselves Pro-Lives. And that's a big gain in two-years, is eight points, and we'll take that. What I'm hoping happens too, and you talking about that and reminding people about it, hopefully that 14% will at least not vote for the state referendums that are coming up to say, Hey, we want a state referendum that makes abortion legal at all point in time for every reason, for whatever you want to do. Hopefully those will be harder to pass. They're not pro-life, but they, if we can get them to be less radical. But the fact that we did pick up 8%, which is more than half of those who are no longer for abortion in any circumstance. That is some good news tucked into what you were just talking about. 

Rick Green [00:16:00] I love how you said that to Tim on, if we don't disciple our kids, you know, the world's going to, and I'd say I'd apply that even not to just our own kids and grandkids, but those who are in our sphere, or even just thinking about it as the church, you, know, as a whole. And the beauty of these programs that are developing more and more, not just us at Patriot Academy and Wall Builders and the training programs we do in the summer, but now we're seeing more and effort from churches that understand the culture war that's going on. As they're beginning to invest in their own programs and starting to have summer and even one-year programs. The example that Tim Brooks and the folks up at Christian Ministries and Hot Springs set for decades and decades is now being adopted by more and more programs around the country. So anyway, I just say that in general to say, I think we're catching onto this. And I think even beyond our little circle and our sphere that we've got, I think the church in general is starting to realize the importance of what you just said. And I would just amplify that. If we don't disciple. These young people that God has entrusted to us in our families, in our circle at church and in our communities, the world absolutely will because they understand if they get them young and they disciple them that they will go that way towards evil instead of towards what God has for them. All right, quick break, folks. We got more good news when we return you're listening to the WallBuilder show 

Rick Green [00:18:25] Welcome back, thanks for staying with us on this Good News Friday here on The WallBuilders Show, and I think that last one we were all commenting on, but I think it was Tim, so David, I think the ping-pong ball's back on your court. Or pickleball. Or tennis ball. Whatever the right analogy is. Or metaphor. Tim was comm- 

David Barton [00:18:39]  Tim was commenting on mine.  

Rick Green [00:18:40] Oh, Tim was com- see, whether it was a pickleball, a ping-pong ball, or a tennis ball, I had the wrong side of the court. So all of them thrown back to you, Tim. 

Tim Barton [00:18:50] All right, well, one of the things that is worth noting, there's been a lot of good Supreme Court decisions. We've talked about some of them. One of them, I have an article in my stack. It is Matt Mahan versus New York. And in this article, it highlights that the Supreme Court ruled against the lower court where there was an injunction and the lower court said when president Trump moved to go to the Department of Education and say, Hey, we don't need all these people that are here. He fired a whole bunch of them and there was a lawsuit. There was an appeal. There was a lower court had an injunction and said, you know what, president Trump, you need to rehire a bunch of those people. It was unlawful for you to fire people that work for you. And now. There's a lot of irony in so many layers of that, but the Supreme Court and a six three decision, and actually in this decision, there was no opinion written, so it literally was just a decision saying they're wrong and president Trump has the authority to fire these 1400 people he was trying to fire from an apartment of education. So a six, three decision that allows president Trump to move forward with working to, before he closes and shuts down. You have to dismantle, first is what he said, but he wants to dismantled and then shut down Department of Education. This is part of the dismantling process and the Supreme Court has once again affirmed that President Trump has the authority to do this, which overall is really good news. 

Rick Green [00:20:18] And also returns us back to what we've been saying all along that, you know, the executive branch, the president's in charge of the executive branch should be able to make these kinds of decisions. Okay, David, back to you, brother. 

David Barton [00:20:29] Well, this is another moral issue. And this comes from another Gallup survey. Gallup's surveyed 17 moral issues to see where the nation was on these morals and what the nation thinks are most important morals and where do Americans agree on which morals, so. 

Tim Barton [00:20:44] Hey, let me also interject. It used to be when you would bring these up and George Barna was looking at like, you know, that the 30, whatever different moral behaviors people have, it used to be a decade ago. I was like, I can't even imagine what different 30 moral behaviors, people have. But now when you say stuff like this and I'm like, oh, we can add gender, we can add boys and girls sports, we can have gender mutilation. It's crazy. Now that in my brain, I'm like, oh, these big numbers of moral behavior, not even complicated to think there might be that many things with how crazy our culture has gotten and I know that's a total side note but as you're about to give us a number of these 17 different things that are there it's not hard for my brain to process anymore that there's lots of different moral thoughts out there that it used to be so extreme I couldn't even imagine it now I'm like oh no I see it I totally see we have all these struggles and issues so not to take away from it I'm ready what are the 17 moral issues or guides. 

David Barton [00:21:43] I'm going to start with the three that are most divisive and I'm going to end with the 3 that are the most uniting and the 3 that are mostly divisive, Tim, you just hit some of them and we talked about it in the last last good news piece was the 3 most divisives of issues where America's most divided amorals is transgenderism, abortion and same sex relationships. And that that division really is actually kind of partisan as well. If you take for example, for a person to change their gender, 71% of Democrats think that's morally acceptable to change your gender. Only 9% of Republicans think it's morally acceptable. The second one that's the most divisive is abortion, which we were talking about earlier. 78% of democrats think that abortion is morally acceptable. Only 20% of republicans, but that is 20%, think that abortions is morally acceptable and the third most divisiv issue was same-sex relations. 86% of Democrats think that same-sex relations are morally acceptable. And 38% of Republicans think they're morally acceptable. So of the 17 items, those are the three that are the most divided among Americans on the 17 moral issues that they look at. 

Tim Barton [00:22:52] Well, dad, looking at the first one and how divided America is on the transgender issue, it does, it does make me wonder sometimes how these questions are worded and maybe even the age group, because if we're talking about kids that are doing this, I could see only 9% of Republicans are like going to be supportive of kids doing that. However, if it was people 18 or 21 or 25 years old, it seems like that number might be higher. However, what's not it's interesting that people are like pro trans in some areas. What's not necessarily divisive in the country? Is the fact that the majority of the country thinks that transgenders, a biological male that identifies as a female should not be playing in female sports. And so it's interesting where that crossover line is, that the majority of Americans or seemingly a huge percentage of Americans favor transgenderism. And especially as you mentioned, Democrats are super supportive of it. But the majority of Americans, and I would even think the majority of Democrats would acknowledge we don't want biological males playing in female sports. So it is interesting not just how divided we are as a nation, but also where some of the polarization. I'm curious how it was worded because I think there is more similarity on some of these things depending on if we're talking about a certain age or if we talk about sports or various things in there. So that's a side note, but I am curious. To see more details on that. 

David Barton [00:24:15] Now this next one, these are the top three things where Americans are most united on what they think is a moral or rather an immoral behavior. So do you guys wanna take a shot at guessing what the number one issue that most unites Americans on a moral issue, do you wanna take a shot of guessing what that number one issue is? I'm gonna tell you that 89% of Americans disapprove of this, now 89% disapprove of this behavior. And it's only 11% of Democrats approve it, only 4% of Republicans approve of it, 89% of Americans disapprove of this behavior. Tell me what we're talking about. 

Rick Green [00:24:53] I'm going to guess child sex trafficking, but I'd hate to think that 11% of Americans are okay with that. 

Tim Barton [00:24:58] Yeah, same thing, Rick. I was thinking human trafficking, but I can't imagine that there's a percentage of people going, oh, I think it's totally fine. So now makes me think is this something like prostitution? That's right. I could see some people being okay with it. But the majority of Americans saying we don't want to do that. Dad, I'm very curious. What is it? 

David Barton [00:25:16] It's adultery, sex outside of marriage, out for married people. Adultery is the number one thing that unites Americans. Among the 17 things that they looked at here, so the 17 on their list, that is the moral issue that they look at that has the most united support among Americans is adultery is wrong. Number two on the list was cloning and number three on the lists was suicide. So those are the three areas that most Americans agree are morally unacceptable, Democrats and Republicans, which is interesting. I would not have picked that as the top issues, but that is some of that traditional morality looks like it's coming back around in some areas, although there clearly is division in other areas as well. 

Rick Green [00:25:58] I guess, you know, we kind of saw the evidence of that with the tech guy, whatever his name was, that CEO that was, seen, you know, having an adulterous affair on camera at that concert. And almost universally, everybody spoke out against it. And I was actually surprised because in a more morally relativistic society, fewer people were saying, you know, that marriage shouldn't even be between one man and one woman, let alone, uh, you know, adultery outside of marriage, being okay. So that was a, that was good sign. Seeing that evidence on social media and the backlash. And then of course, the data you just gave us, David proves that. So good stuff guys. So much good news. I got to head into the weekend with what we've done so far. We'll have more for you next week. Have a great weekend. And thanks so much for listening to the WallBuilders Show.