The Vanishing Black Church w/ Delano Squires | Grimké Books Vol. III
In 1965, when one in four black children was born out of wedlock, it was called a national crisis. Today it's seven in ten, and the silence is deafening. So how did marriage become optional, and who will lead the way back? In Volume III of the Grimké Review of Books, Delano Squires of the Heritage Foundation joins the profs to discuss his new book, The Vanishing Black Family: why slavery couldn't destroy the black family but welfare and feminism undermined it from within, why you can't sow Snoop Dogg and reap the Huxtables, and why rebuilding the home starts in the church.
SKIP AHEAD.
(00:00) Coming up...
(00:22) Welcome: Delano Squires
(05:50) How the Book Came About
(07:32) Equity in Every Structure Except Family Structure
(10:04) Slavery Deformed the Black Family, But Didn't Destroy It
(15:02) Two Cultural Shocks: Welfare and Second-Wave Feminism
(16:37) "You Trade a Man for The Man"
(19:09) "Marriage Is for White People"
(21:05) Rejecting Destructive Media
(23:10) You Can't Sow Snoop Dogg and Reap the Huxtables
(26:22) Everyone Has Access to the Village Idiot
(28:31) Where Do We Start to Rebuild?
(30:41) The Four Houses: Church, School, State, and Art
(31:05) Black Liberation Theology: A Barrier to Family Reconstruction
(32:37) BLM vs. the "Western-Prescribed Nuclear Family"
(37:37) The Church Is the Most Important House
(39:20) "Bigger Government or Better White People"
(41:22) The Iron Triangle
(44:46) Don't Outsource Your Moral Agency
(47:49) "Ain't No Santa Coming Here"
(50:58) The Moynihan Report vs. The Vanishing Black Family
(54:28) Six Obstacles to Family Revival
(56:45) Reasons for Hope
(59:34) Right Message, Wrong Audience
(01:04:15) The War Room vs. the War Zone
(01:09:46) 77% Have Cohabited: What Pastors Are Facing
(01:12:38) Birth Control at 18, IVF at 38
MENTIONED WORKS.
(00:49) The Vanishing Black Family by Delano Squires
(34:50) The Cross and the Lynching Tree by James H. Cone
(50:03) "West India Emancipation" (speech) by Frederick Douglass
(51:07) The Negro Family: The Case for National Action by Daniel Patrick Moynihan
READ FIRST.
Squires, Delano. The Vanishing Black Family: How Welfare and Feminism Made Marriage Optional and Children Vulnerable. New York: Sentinel, 2026.
✧ https://www.amazon.com/dp/0593852672
FURTHER RECOMMENDED READING.
Moynihan, Daniel Patrick. The Negro Family: The Case for National Action. Washington, DC: Office of Policy Planning and Research, U.S. Department of Labor, 1965.
✧ https://www.dol.gov/general/aboutdol/history/webid-moynihan
Sowell, Thomas. Black Rednecks and White Liberals. San Francisco: Encounter Books, 2005.
✧ https://www.amazon.com/dp/1594030863
Steele, Shelby. The Content of Our Character: A New Vision of Race in America. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1990.
✧ https://www.amazon.com/dp/0312049501
Steele, Shelby. White Guilt: How Blacks and Whites Together Destroyed the Promise of the Civil Rights Era. New York: HarperCollins, 2006.
✧ https://www.amazon.com/dp/0060578629
Williams, Walter E. Race & Economics: How Much Can Be Blamed on Discrimination? Stanford: Hoover Institution Press, 2011.
✧ https://www.amazon.com/dp/0817912452
QUESTION OR TOPIC SUGGESTION?
✦ https://grimke.org/topics
THE GRIMKÉ PODCAST.
All Episodes: https://grimke.org/podcast
IN THIS VIDEO.
Delano Squires — Director, Richard and Helen DeVos Center for Human Flourishing (The Heritage Foundation)
✧ Bio: https://www.heritage.org/staff/delano-squires
Dr. Doug Logan Jr. — President (Grimké)
✧ Bio: https://grimkeseminary.org/doug-logan
Bryan Laughlin — Chancellor & CEO (Grimké)
✧ Bio: https://grimkeseminary.org/bryan-laughlin
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