Here’s Controversy for You – God’s Not Dead: We the People (2021)

God’s Not Dead: We the People – Summary

When a social worker sits in on a session of the St. Jude’s Homeschool Cooperative, she doesn’t like what she sees. The children learn about the “Noah myth” alongside their other subjects. Greatly interested in stopping the co-op’s program, she escalates the situation and lands the members in court. The Rev. Dave Hill, who supports the group tries to reason with the family court judge, but his attempts at persuasion fail and the co-op members, including Mike and Rebecca McKinnon and Taylor Hays, are ordered to enroll their children in the public school within ten days or face heavy fines and incarceration.

What We Liked

God’s Not Dead We The People returns to a stronger stance on religious freedom after the weak message portrayed in A Light in The Darkness. In the previous film, Christians were blamed for the violent attack committed by atheists and were told they needed to apologize and concede to their demands. A stark contrast to the message portrayed in the first two movies in the God’s Not Dead franchise.

Opposite from what the majority of movie critics are saying, we mark this movie two stars down out ten not because it was too harsh in presenting “conspiracy theory”-type ideas, but because it was not strong enough. We noticed two occasions where a weak stance was taken in order to appease the non-conservative part of the audience.

Rev. Hill attempts water down the Bible when he says it was one of the most pro-feminist documents at the time it was written. What is this to mean other than Christians are or should be the real feminists? This argument does not make sense in light of the modern mainstream feminist movement, which strays far from the Biblical perspective of the issue.

In a prior scene, Mrs. Hays says there is a common misconception of home school parents, in that they are “flat earthers” who question the moon landing. However, many of the few people who do believe the earth is flat probably do educate their children at home. This belief does not disqualify them in their right to do so.

Searching for reviews on the God’s Not Dead series reveals a host of reviews from “Christians” and non-Christians alike who frankly hate the series. Problem is, the low ratings are based on straw man arguments, bias, and disregard for facts that don’t fit with the author’s evaluation. We wanted to take the time to examine some of these other reviews and show readers how writer’s opinions can be packaged as fact.

Are the independent reviews biased? They most certainly are. Take this article for example; we write with a pro-family, pro-Judeo-Christian bias. This means we accept the basic presuppositions inherent of fundamentalist Christianity. Other authors, however, have anti-Christian biases evidenced by their scorn for God’s Not Dead: We the People’s Christian principles.

Most of the negative critics (whose posts interestingly occupy most of the first-page search results) begin by claiming that the movie is based upon fictitious, irrational concerns. Steve Pulaski, on his website Stevepulaski.com affirms to have done his research on the persecution of homeschoolers in the U.S. in which he determined that laws regarding homeschooling are up to the states. He also reported no Congressional action against homeschooling at the National level.

Mr. Pulaski is absolutely correct in saying these things, but what he deliberately leaves out are the many cases, illustrated amply by the HSLDA (Home School Legal Defense Association) that demonstrate serious persecution and discrimination against homeschoolers. Based on an article published by Action Institute the ability for parents to homeschool their children is under attack in a very real way.

Second District Court of Appeal (CA) Justice H. Walter Croskey wrote in his opinion on the 2008 Long case, “Additionally, the parents are subject to being ordered to enroll their children in an appropriate school or education program and provide proof of enrollment to the court, and willful failure to comply with such an order may be punished by a fine for civil contempt.” This case illustrates the exact issue God’s Not Dead: We the People was concerned with.

“There is no movement to end homeschooling” – Steve Pulaski

If the cases against homeschooling are considered it must be admitted that there is a desire among those in power to end it, to stop its free practice in the U.S.. If no movement exists to end homeschooling, why do are the governments of liberal states like California so bent on exterminating other options for education?

Pulaski declares that while Muslims and Jews face religious discrimination, Christianity faces no such persecution. Many instances of Christianity losing its influence on society are illustrated by the removal of any form of religion from the public school. Bible reading, prayer, and Christian art and literature are all banned from public institutions but atheism – a religion grounded in faith in rationalism – remains. It is atheism that might be called the dominant religion in the Western world.

To prove that homeschoolers don’t face opposition Pulaski cites two Twitter threads written by the Coalition for Responsible Homeschooling. In these pages the organization alleges that the God’s Not Dead franchise used their logo on the shirt of one of the homeschool supporters. One of the threads claims that the character is “likely a villain”. This could not be further from the case. The woman is pro-homeschooling and not a member of the Congressional or public School committees.

If the franchise mischaracterized the Coalition for Responsible Homeschooling, it has nothing to do with opposition to homeschooling. It merely has to do with the organization’s terror of being labeled “anti-vaxxer”.

Some critics, including Joseph Holmes, alleged that the film contained bad acting and cinematography. We happened to notice an interesting fallacy in Holme’s criticism as found in his article published at Christianitytoday.com . The third movie in the God’s Not Dead series, God’s Not Dead: A Light in the Darkness, took a different approach from the others. It portrays David Hill as learning to become apologetic towards opposing atheists – a narrative that Christians audiences generally did appreciate.

Holmes praises A Light in the Darkness which is suddenly “well written” and “well acted”. The main character in both movies is David A. R. White, but Jeannie Pirro and Benjamin A. Onyango also star in both films. Obviously, Holmes bias against the message of We the People, not the cinematic quality.

Holmes also opposes how the film “demonizes” those who disagree with Christianity/homeschooling. But as a Christian movie, who would expect the film to treat those who oppose its teachings as anything other than villains?

Another writer, Anthony Barber of Thegospelcoalition.org claimed that Christian movies like the God’s Not Dead series pull a bait-and-switch on their non-Christian audience by enticing them to watch their films and then preaching at them. Anthony wrote in his article “The Problem with Christian Films”, “Hey, we know you love art; here is our art over here!” and then “P.S. Now that we have you in the theater, we would like to convert you.” Seeing as the title of the movie series is God’s not Dead, this bait and switch claim seems hard to accept. Practically all Christian movies can be easily identified for what they are: Christian movies.

Mr. Holmes concluded his article for Christianitytoday.com that God’s Not Dead (specifically referring to the first film in the series) could have been made far better if it had been produced by an intellectual and nuanced critic like himself. As he is an award-nominated filmmaker, we are waiting for Mr. Holmes to release his superior movie.

All these authors articles really review is their biased opinions against the film. It comes as no surprise that Steve Pulaski’s 1/2 star rating for God’s Not Dead: We the People is shared with his ratings of all the other movies in the series. Readers should be well aware that when reading hyper-critical reviews like some of those mentioned above (We only sampled a few for our article) only the authors opinion will be presented and any evidence supporting their claims may be grossly distorted. Several of the authors, including Pulaski and Holmes, criticized the film for its “distortion of reality”, when in fact it seems the only misrepresentation is on their own part.

Antonio Sabato Jr. (Mike McKinnon)

Amanda Jaros (Taylor Hays)

Hadeel Sittu (Ayisha Moradi)

William Forsythe (Sen. Benson)

David A. R. White (Rev. Dave Hill)

Isaiah Washington (Rep. Smith)

Marco Khan (Misrab)

Deborah Tucker (Congresswoman Denise Campbell)

Francesca Battistelli (Rebecca McKinnon)

Paul Kwo (Martin Yip)

Jeannie Pirro (Judge Neely)

God’s Not Dead: We the People Watch Options

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Cautions

We found no issues with God’s Not Dead: We the People. It is suitable for all members of the family, although older children will be better able to appreciate the message.

Our Rating 8/10