Oliver North’s evangelical conversion followed a personal crisis and James Dobson’s parenting advice

Evidence

In 1978, North experienced a personal religious transformation. His commanding officer at the time, Lt. Col. John S. Grinalds, was a born-again Christian, and he convinced North to leave behind the Catholicism of his youth and embrace charismatic Protestantism. (The fact that North’s priest was a leading proponent of disarmament might have played into this decision.) This wasn’t North’s first exposure to evangelical Protestantism. In the mid-1970s, his wife Betsy, “tired of living with a headstrong military leader” who was absent as a husband and father, had asked for a divorce. The two agreed to marital counseling, and while waiting in the lobby for their first appointment, North picked up a book: James Dobson’s Dare to Discipline. He credited it with saving his marriage. After his conversion, North joined a predominantly white, charismatic congregation of the Episcopal church that seamlessly blended patriotism and Christianity. — Kristin Kobes Du Mez, Jesus and John Wayne, 283

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to the book’s larger thesis about Dobson and Focus on the Family as a central node in the evangelical consumer apparatus; marriage crisis routed through a parenting manual.
• QUESTION: Worth verifying: Dare to Discipline is a parenting book — how did it function as marital counseling literature? What does that say about the Dobson brand’s reach?