IBLP and shinny happy people

What Should Christians Know about IBLP and Shiny Happy People: Duggar Family Secrets?
Since the release of Amazon’s Shiny Happy People, folks are talking about Gothard and his IBLP. You’d heard of the Duggars, but did you know about the philosophy which shaped their culture?
MIKE LEAKE
BORROWED LIGHT
JUN 09, 2023
What Should Christians Know about IBLP and Shiny Happy People: Duggar Family Secrets?
In college and seminary, I learned about the philosophical and theological underpinnings of many of the movements of our day. We dove deep into thinkers like David Hume, Immanuel Kant, Jacques Derrida, and many others.

We noted their impact on various worldly philosophies of our day. We also analyzed the impact of activists and sociologists like Margaret Sanger, Karl Marx, Max Weber, and more.

But there was something that we seldom looked at. Our own philosophical and theological foundations. Where’d the idea of umbrellas of authority come from?

What about the idea of not “defrauding” one another through how you dress or act? Where did we get some of our principles of courtship and dating? Where does the idea come from that children are a “quiverfull” of arrows to redeem culture?

It was simply assumed that these principles, or perhaps called basic life principles, stemmed from the Bible. I’d never even heard of a man named Bill Gothard or the Institute in Basic Life Principles (IBLP).

And yet, many of his views were running rampant in the culture and teaching of the conservative college and seminary which I attended.

You’ve likely been hearing the name Bill Gothard more recently. Since the release of Amazon’s Shiny Happy People, folks have been talking about Gothard and his IBLP. You’d heard of the Duggars, but did you know about the philosophy which shaped their culture?

What Is the IBLP?
The Institute in Basic Life Principles (IBLP) was founded in 1961 as a local outreach in Chicago. Its stated purpose is to “teach the wisdom and truth of Scripture as the foundation of every area of life.”


They attempt to fulfill their mission through conferences, retreats, and seminars as well as providing many homeschool families with their “trusted teaching.”

In the 1960s and 1970s, the foundation of the movement was Gothard’s Basic Youth Conflicts seminar. In 1974 these seminars coalesced into the Institute in Basic Youth Conflicts (IBYC). In the late 70’s they began publishing books, most notably a popular story of a missionary entitled The Pineapple Story.

In 1984, with many becoming disenchanted with the public school system, a need arose to provide homeschooling curriculum. The Advanced Training Institute of America (ATIA) was launched with 102 families participating in the seminal program.

The popularity of the institute exploded among homeschool families in the late 80s and early 90s, even reaching globally. In 1989, the name was changed to its current name — Institute in Basic Life Principles.

In 2000, a 2200-acre campus was built in Texas to house the home offices and the International ALERT Academy. ALERT stands for Air Land Resource Emergency Team.

According to their website, it is an intense “post-high-school, Christian discipleship and training program for young men who want to live with purpose and make an impact. We forge men to be spiritually sound, physically fit, and ready to serve.”

The movement continued to expand through the early 2000s, in part because of the popularity of the TLC show 19 Kids and Counting. The show followed the life of the Duggar Family and their eventual 19 children.

The Duggars were proponents of the IBLP, used their curriculum, and spoke at their seminars. When the popularity of the Duggars rose, so also did the teaching of the IBLP.

In 2014, Bill Gothard was accused of sexual harassment. This led to a more open critique of the organization and its teachings. Gothard stepped down in 2014, and the Institute moved offices from Texas to Illinois.

Though its influence has waned from its pinnacle days, the IBLP continues to this day, still influencing many families.

Who Is Bill Gothard?
Bill Gothard was born into a Christian family in 1934. He received degrees from Wheaton College in 1961. In the early 1960s, Gothard became concerned with helping other youth make wise choices in their life.

He came up with what he called “seven biblical, non-optional principles of life.” These are the seven principles:

1. Design: know the specific purpose for why God created you.

2. Authority: inward peace results when people respect and honor the God-given authority in their lives.

3. Responsibility is when you have a clear conscience when you realize you are responsible for every thought, word, action, and motive. You are also responsible for seeking forgiveness when you offend others.


4. Suffering is the idea that we allow hurts from offenders and welcome them for revealing “blind spots” in our lives. You must overcome bitterness with forgiveness.

5. Ownership is the principle that we are stewards and not owners of our possessions.

6. Freedom: true freedom is having the power and the desire to do what is right.

7. Success is the notion that when we follow God, meditate on His ways, memorize Scripture, and make wise decisions, we will successfully fulfill our life purposes.

This was the core of what Gothard taught and was part of the seminars which made him wildly popular in fundamentalist and conservative circles in the 70s and 80s. Many of his seminars were attended by more than 10,000 people.

In the early ’80s, Gothard moved his focus to homeschooling. He was responsible for creating the education program which revolved around these biblical principles, writing 54 “Wisdom booklets,” which taught geography, science, math, history, and other subjects from a fundamentalist Christian perspective.

Though Gothard himself never married, he was influential in shaping conservative families for decades. Gothard taught the importance of family structure and emphasized the man’s role within the home.

In 2011, a website was launched with former students sharing their negative or harmful experiences at the hands of IBLP and even, specifically, Gothard. In 2012, one courageous woman, Lizzie, came forward to share that she had been inappropriately touched by Gothard as a teen.

This opened the door for more than 30 other women to make similar allegations. In 2014, Gothard resigned from his position. He was sued in 2015 and 2016, and those cases were eventually dropped in 2018. He counter-sued his accusers, but the countersuit was dismissed.

What Are the Issues with IBLP?
This is actually a difficult question to answer for a wider audience. If you are a fundamentalist, a conservative, and adhere to patriarchal theology and quiverfull theology, there will be some (or many) things within the teaching of Gothard which you find no issue with.

Others will have varying degrees of difficulty with the movement. I will share the most problematic teachings/actions and then move toward those which are concerns for some but not others.

First, one has to look at the case of Josh Duggar. Certainly, we cannot make a one-to-one causality with IBLP and Duggar’s sexual assault of several underage girls, including his own sisters.

There are many who were raised in this movement that do not download child pornography on their computers. The teaching of Gothard does not cause sexual assault. But does it create a culture where those with this propensity are left unchecked?
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