Many of you know Kirk Cameron from his days of playing Mike sever on the ABC sitcom Growing Pains. He's also starred in films and television roles since then. But he has made a name for himself for being bold in his faith, for being a devout Christian, for not being afraid to speak up and speak out about his faith. His first Christian children's book was with Brave Books. It was called You Grow, and he's out with another one.
It's called Pride Comes Before the Fall. It's part of a broader series he's doing on the Seven Deadly Sins. So we're going to talk to him about that, talk to him about his walk in faith. Talk to him about when he struggled with Pride on Growing Pains when he was seventeen and eighteen years old working in Hollywood, you know, a Hollywood television program, being exposed to so much so, how did he find humility? He gets candid
about that and so much more. Talk about the state of the country as well, what they're trying to do to kids, all that and more with Kirk Cameron.
Stay with us.
Kurt cameraon It's such an honor to have you on the show. I really appreciate you making the time.
Oh my pleasure, Thanks for having me.
You're out with a new book called Pride Comes Before the Fall. It's with Brave Books. I know that you've written a book previously with them. Talk a little bit about what's the message of the book, why'd you decide to write it.
I've been criss crossing the country since about December of last year reading children's stories about wisdom and virtue, and I found that people are coming out of the woodwork, parents, grandparents, and children to hear stories that are not just fun for the family, but actually teach the values that lead to a healthy future and blessing for kids. And my newest one, Pride Comes Before the Fall, is all about humility, and I think that it couldn't come out at a
better time. We're about to launch into Pride Month, where pride is now being celebrated as a virtue when it's not. In fact, of the seven Deadly sins, it's the deadliest because because pride ultimately makes you self centered, it just you know, just drop it into any relationship and think of how a prideful person makes you feel. They're all about themselves. You don't want a husband like that. You don't want a spouse like that. You don't want to
teach that do. You want them to be humble and kind, thinking of others first. So that's what this story is all about. And it's it's kind of like a it's a little annoying, a little disturbing to some people who really want to lean into pride. But I want to lean into the virtues that bring blessing to our country into the next generation. And that's why I'm reading it in public libraries all over the country.
Kirk, you realize that you were talking about humility and to encourage people to not be self centered in the age of TikTok and the and the age of influencing, in the age of posting pictures for likes?
What do you think that does to young people? This society that we live in.
We're you know, we're living for likes and we're living for the fake accepted of others.
I had a pride problem when I was seventeen, eighteen, nineteen years old on growing Pains. Think of it here. I am a teenage kid who's now famous, who's on a television show making money. It is so easy to think that the world revolves around you. In fact, that that's the stereotype of celebrities. And I think that's what social media has done, is turn everyone into a celebrity in their own everyone's a star in the movie about themselves,
on their own TikTok or on their own Instagram. And pride is something that is so dangerous that it destroys marriages, it destroys families, and it destroys countries. And that's not hyperbole. When a country rips prayer out of schools, makes the Ten Commandments illegal in courtrooms, and replaces the morality that made this the freest, strongest, most generous nation in the world. With a morality that says it's okay for men to pretend to be women and dance sexually in lingerie in
front of toddlers, We've got a big problem. And the cure for that is humility. The Bible, in fact, devotes an entire book called Proverbs to warning about the dangers of pride and encouraging the value of humility. And I think kids deserve to know the truth about it.
Why do you think we have become so inward facing or we have you know, you talked about some of these things that's happening to children. Why are we like this? It seems to be a quick acceleration as well. Why is it accelerating so quickly.
I actually don't think it's accelerating quickly. I think it's happened over a long time of neglect. In fact, if you read the writings of our founders and our forefathers and four Mothers, they would tell you that the only kind of people who can handle freedom are people who love God and have moral integrity. And those two things go hand in hand. If you don't continue to nourish that in succeeding generations, you wind up with immoral people
who think that they can play God themselves. And so you wind up over time with that monster of pride that rejects God and tries to assert itself as the as the standard maker. And we get to a place where we mutilate children's bodies in the name of gender affirming care. We do all sorts of things that you and I look at and say, this is abhorrent, this
is lewd, this is crazy. How did we get here? Well, I think it's been a slow grow over time, and it's been under the radar and it's been convenient because public schools are a really nice babysitter, and when we're not watching what's happening, our children can be led astray, and the whole culture can go down the tubes as long as we are comfortable with entertainment and distractions. So I think that's exactly what's happened, and now we're reaping
the benefit. I'm sorry, the results of not carefully caring for the values and the faith in this country.
Let's take a quick commercial break more with Kirk Cameron. Isn't the transgender stuff a mocking of God? To say that you're to mock God's creation?
I think that it's finally dawning on people. It's like more and more people are being red pilled and they're recognizing that they have been living in a woke matrix. And now they're saying, wait a minute. We have men who are pretending to be women and saying that they're real women, And how is that not erasing womanhood altogether? How is that not mocking women? And how are people
not waking up to this universally? I mean, we wouldn't let women strippers and poll dancers gyrate in front of children. In public libraries, but will let men who pretend to be women and dress up in exaggerations of femininity gyrate and touch children. And we call that diversity and inclusion and tolerance. So it gets weirder and weirder. It's like
the freak show at the circus. And my hope and my prayer is that when more and more people speak the truth and get us back to the plumb line for morality and politics and faith, that we can course correct before this country goes over the falls.
It's being celebrated.
I mean, you look at what the LA Dodgers are doing with the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, this LGBTQ transgender group. They pull dance on a cross depicting Jesus. You know, they push views in favor of abortion rights, you know, a mocking of faith. But they're doing it in plain sight. I mean, they're they're going to be doing this in Pride month.
That's right. So what I'm trying to do is be the kind of person that doesn't just complain about what's wrong, but actually creates the culture we want for our kids. As I travel the country, I've found there two different kinds of people reporters and reformers, and they're not the same. Reporters talk about the hypocrisy that they see, they're saying,
this is crazy. Wake up, Wake up. But it takes a certain kind of person to actually come up with a solution and have the moral grip to stand against the opposition and then have a real ground game to make a change. And when I go back through history, the heroes that made all the difference, that abolished slavery, or established women's rights, or resisted tyranny and set up
a free, constitutional republic like ours, these were reformers. They weren't just armchair quarterbacks, you know, typing away in their basement to get likes and clicks. These are people who are actually making changes. And the truth is we see people on the left, progressives who are doing lots of reforming. They're reforming morality, they're reforming politics. They're reforming the economy, not in a good way. In fact, that kind of
of reformation is really deformation. They're deforming families. They're deforming government, which was designed to protect property, now it's plundering property. They're deforming children, and even the very concept of what it means to be a man or a woman or human, and all this is happening on the watch of good people who are sitting back and maybe thinking this will pass. It's really not that bad. Let's not overreact. It's just
conspiracy theory. But I've found that the difference between a conspiracy theory and the truth has been about six months and ever since COVID. I think the curtain is being pulled back and people are now starting to realize what's going on. There is an coordinated effort to fundamentally destabilize America and reorganizer according to an entirely different system.
A lot of people live in fear, and to some degree, you'll, rightfully so when you look at it. I know that on one of your engagements and speaking at Seattle Public Library, you brought along Joe Kennedy, the high school football coach who has fired for praying with students at games. You know, Fortunately he's been reinstated as a result of the Supreme
Court case ruling in favor of him. But people see that, you know, and I think the intention is for people to live in fear, to speak out about their faith, to live out their faith.
I mean, the point is the fear.
Yeah, Fear is a great motivator, and so we should all have our spidy senses, making the hair on our arms and backs stand up when we hear a government that is becoming more and more authoritarian say things like you must do this for your safety. We are here to help keep you safe, and we see this everywhere. We're going to educate your children because we're the professionals. Don't worry about the drag queens grooming your children. Don't
worry about vaccines that are clearly causing problems. We're the government and we're here to keep you safe. And while people are stuck in their houses because they've been infected with the fear virus, which is far worse than any COVID virus, the fear virus, it actually causes people to give up the most precious thing, and that is their common sense and their liberties. And I believe it was perhaps it was John Adams, one of our founding fathers, who said that anyone who is willing to give up
their liberties for a little safety deserves neither. And that's what we see happening. What I say is faith is greater than fear. Don't fear the government or those who try to pressure you, because there's many more of us than there are of them. And if we stand together and we're humble and sincere in the cause of what's just and true, I think God will come to our aid. And in the past, that's when seeing great awakenings and great great revivals. We can have a bloodless revolution where
nobody gets hurt. We don't need a civil war. What we need is a revolution of the heart and people get back to humility and gratitude. If we do that, man, miracles happen.
You've been touring the United States, reading your book at various libraries and talking to people and seeing crowds, and what has your experience been like in doing that?
You know, what are you seeing?
What does it tell you about America with this journey that you've been on.
Well since I've been reading these children's books, which are part of a whole series of books at Brave Books. And I love this company because they're on a mission to take back not just story hour in public libraries, but every minute of every day for parents to stay in charge and be in the lead with what their kids are learning. So they have all sorts of books and my experience has been that parents and grandparents are
coming out of the woodwork. Perception is not reality. The perception is that the whole world is moving away from pro god, pro America values, and that's just not true. I'm actually on the ground in thousands of schools and churches and conferences all over the country, and what I find is that it's an elite minority that is shoving an agenda and a perception through the media that does not reflect the values of the people, but it is
influencing their values, especially the young people. And what we need to do is speak the truth, and we need to be bold about it, and we need to get involved, not stay out of the messy places like Hollywood and entertainment and media. Good people need to go into those places and assume leadership roles. That's how we turn the ship around before it goes over the falls. And that's what I'm trying to do in my humble little way of reading children's books at public libraries.
And it's really children who have been under attack. You know, it's children who've been under attack, whether it's an adult in the name of you know, being a drag queen or whatever it is you know, twerking in front of a children, or you know, sexualizing children. It's children that are the brunt of the attack of this transgender movement and trying to transition young people, telling them that who they are, how God made them is not good enough.
You know, it's children who are being aborted and massed in the United States.
You know it's children who are under attack. Why do you think there is a targeting of children happening.
Playing the long game is always more effective than the short game. Right. Quick results are often exciting to see in your lifetime, but if you're willing to invest in the next generation, the change can be much more long lasting. And that's what everyone who's really interested in building culture knows is that you've got to start with the children. And frankly, that's why God gave boys and girls to moms and dads, not to governments, because moms and dads
really love their children. There's something about a mom and a dad that is willing to be self sacrificing for their children and take less in order to give more to their kids. But governments, particularly authoritative governments, see children as simply a means to an end, and they're the most easily deceived and the most easily impressionable. Their sweet little young minds get brainwashed with this leftist propaganda, and
in forty years that's the new normal. They've created the new community, and they've never known anything else because they were on their tablet, watching TikTok and Instagram and spending seven hours a day in public schools, five days a week for twelve years. And then you can finish them off and really make them into little statist lemmings if you send them to college and graduate school. This kind of worldview is baked into math, science, English history and
everything else. So it's smart to target children. That's why people like Hitler did it. That's why we see destroyers of liberty doing it in our public libraries. And that's why parents need to take back their role as the chief influencer in their children's lives so that they can preserve their future.
You know, there's been some Democrats that have outright, you know, said it, but I really do believe there's an effort under the way to have the government to intervene between children and their parents and to turn the Yeah.
Yes, oh, they already are. I mean, we've already got that I talked to a mom the other day in Minneapolis at a homeschool convention, and these are out of the box thinkers, brave trailblazers who say enough with all
this garbage in the public school. And she was just talking about a bill that was just approved, I believe, by their governor that said if a child comes to their teacher and says, my parents would not allow me to have a gender change operation, that the state will come in and remove that child from the parents and keep them in a government housing facility until all the work is done in order to quote unquote protect the
children from the negative influences of their parents. So this is already happening.
To children, I know, and as adults we have an obligation to stand up and to protect them.
I mean, you know, they're they're innocent. You know, we need to keep them.
And that's what's really sad in all this is there's a loss of innocence with young people, and it's you know, they're told that the world's going to end in ten years. They're told they're not good enough the way God made them. They're told that they should hate themselves based off of the color of their skin. And I just I feel like we're or even just parents taking their kids to
be exposed to some you know, to drag queens. And it's just we're taking the innoc sense from young people and that it makes me so sad.
It is sad. But I think what we need to do is we need to channel all of that sadness and grief, all of that outrage and embarrassment, and recognize one thing. All this happened on our watch and on our parents watched, so grandparents and parents ought to be the most motivated to turn things around. I don't think it's inevitable that America is going to decline and all of our children are going to you know, turn into these you know, half man, half woman, or you know,
half human half animal creatures. It doesn't have to happen. What we need to do is reassert the truth. We need to do it in love, and we need to lead by example. I don't think our hope comes from the White House. I think it comes from your house, at the dinner table, in the living room, when you're with your kids, leading by example. And when we do that, I think that there is lots of hope for the future and that's not just pie in the sky. Hope.
When we die, we go to heaven. I think there have been times, not only in America, but in the rest of the world where things were far worse than this. People of faith were thrown to lions, impaled on polls, and lit on fire to be human torches for gladiatorial games. These were good people who were called criminals because of their faith and their love for their family, and they tried to resist a tyrannical government. We haven't seen anything yet in America, but it will get there if we
let the problem fester. But it can turn around, just like it has in the past. That's called revival, that's called a great awakening. It's happened twice in America. Why not now?
Is that what led you to speak up for liberty during COVID Because I know you've received some criticism throughout you know, speaking out and all. You know, anytime you're bold, you're on the receiving end of criticism. But I know that you hosted Christmas caroling gatherings in two thousand, getting people together, which you're criticized for. Why did you decide to do that, to speak out, to stand up during that time during COVID.
Because I'm afraid of what happens if we don't speak up. You look at I keep, I keep mentioning these these eras in history. But you know, I've got I've got some Taiwanese neighbors. I've got some some Russian Jewish neighbors up the street. I've got some Cuban friends at church, and all of them tell me the same story. They say, we fled our countries because there's no liberty there. There's no freedom there. We fled these places and came to the heaven of America. And now we feel like we're
watching a horror movie that we have seen before. And what's happening in America. Americans don't recognize what's going on because they're they're sort of oblivious, and they just think they live in this happy land, this Disneyland kind of place where nothing could possibly go wrong. But I recognize that when when we when we see evil on the horizon, you must talk about it. You must say that it's
that it's there. And that's why I'm speaking up. You know, when they when they say you need to be stuck inside of your house after they let strip clubs weed shops and abortion clinics open their doors during COVID. I say, bull, this is not right. There's something else going on here. And so I met at the beach and in parking lots during Christmas so that people suffering with depression, anxiety and loneliness can come out and sing silent night. They
can sing God bless America. They can be together with people and find some companionship. That's not that's not that's not being a super spreader unless you mean a super spreader of hope and a spreader of community. I think that there is. I think that there's great.
Immunity in community, and we need to continue changing our country by joining forces, get together with people of like mind and value and move forward, don't retreat well.
And I also think that when people step up like you and are brave, it does encourage other people to do the same. And to your point, you know, with building that community, it starts to breed and other people, joe In and other people, it leads to more and more people speaking up and being bold themselves. You had mentioned when you're on growing pains and being so young, you know, seventeen to eighteen years old and struggling with pridefulness? How did you find humility?
I grew up with so many young actors, and it's rare when an actor on television as a kid grows up relatively well adjusted. So many of my friends that I auditioned with, like River Phoenix and Corey Haim, both of them are no longer with us. There are pressures and environments that are so negative and so for me. Honestly, I met a girl who I wanted to date, and she took me to church. I heard the message of the Gospel, which I did not believe. I was an atheist.
I started asking questions. They were good answers, and I came to a place where I started thinking that, you know what, one day I'm going to die, and if I find out that there's a God in a heaven, I'm not going And I love science. I love biology. It always fascinated me and it always resonated with me that this wasn't just a happy accident, that this was beautiful design. And if that's true, that meant that there
was purpose. And if morality is real, then I'm on the hook guilty and I'm going to need some forgiveness. One day from the creator of all this, All that just made sense to me when I was seventeen, eighteen years old, and I think that's what humbled me. And learning to be humble and kinds has always been that which serves people best, and I'm I'm I'm trying to learn that more and more every day.
It's hard to be kind sometimes, especially when you.
Want to kill people because because they're harming children and they're just trying to they're turning your world upside down. But yeah, what we find is that those who are doing those things, that's actually what they want want us
to do. They want us to get angry, they want us to fight, because if they can get us to fight one another against across racial lines, across religious lines, across you know, the lines of whether or not you've been vaccinated, whether or not you know, you post the black square for BLM or the rainbow for Pride month, then people actually weaken the country. They become divided, and
a house divided against itself is easily conquered. So I say, we need to stick together, and we need to rally around the values that make us strong.
Yeah, I mean, I'm not going to lie.
I definitely struggle with bitterness sometimes in this and getting angry and you know, because sure we all yeah, because well, you know, working in the media, I'm constantly exposed to all this, and so I'm constantly having to you know, read and pay attention to all these terrible things that are happening in the country. And it's hard sometimes to check myself because you do get angry, you know, you do get frustrated with what they're trying to do.
And I think that anger has its place. I think hypocritical anger is where we get into trouble. But we should have a righteous anger when we see children being harmed, when we see something as rare and precious as liberty being stolen and people being deceived, I think that should make us angry. When innocent children are being slaughtered in
the womb, I think that should anger us. But we've got to course correct the right way, and it starts with personal humility and me being a person of integrity myself. So before I point fingers at somebody else, I've got to look in the mirror. If I can't save my own marriage and I'm not willing to fight for my spouse and my family, how am I going to save the nation. How am I going to fight for a country if I'm not willing to fight for what counts
in my home? And I think once we're faithful in small things, God will then allow us to be in charge of greater things.
Quick break, stay with us. So this is part of a series. This first book, Pride Comes before the Fall. I know you've previously written a children's book with Brave, but this is part of a broader series that you're doing on the Seven Deadly Sins.
You know what's next.
We've We've got these seven Deadly sins, which I think are perfect. They're perfect stepping stones that that if you, if you, if you embrace these things, they lead toward misery and ruin. But if you, if you pull up these these these stones of wrath, gluttony, greed, sloth, envy and lust, and the biggest one is pride, I think that you clear the way for a bright future. So we're going to do books on all of these and their and their cures. They're antidotes, and the first one
being pride. Uh is is resolved when you understand and embrace humility. Pride is about me feeding the me monster, exalting myself me before you, and humility is you before me. Uh. I want to be a servant rather than being served, and that that's that's just to me. One of the one of the great gifts from God is when you recognize that it's not all about you. And once you live that way, or at least increasingly live that way,
you find that it attracts others to you. You know, your husband and wife they want to be around you more. Your kids want to be around you more. When it's not all about you and you being better than them, it's about you saying, hey, I'm in the same boat that you are. We're learning together and how can I help you?
Makes sense?
And I like that they're children's books too, as we you know, talk about sort of the targeting of children, and I think it's important to also expose them to the things that you're talking about, you know, and to sort of preempt some of these things that they're going to have to be exposed to and experience in schools.
And right, yeah, we can't keep our head in the sand. That's why I love Brave Books is they have books on you know, the dangers of communism, critical race theory. They've got great books on God's design for gender. There's a book called Elephants or Not Birds, which is a
fabulous book about an elephant who to sing. And then there's a vulture named Culture who tries to convince Kevin the elephant that maybe he really is a bird and gives them some fake wings and a beak to strap on so that he can be essentially a trans bird. And Kevin obviously recognizes that he's been lied to, and that once he learns that God just made him not only an elephant, but a singing elephant, he steps into all of his gifts and his talents and he saves
Freedom Island. And so these are fantastic books that teach virtue to your kids and warn them of cultural dangers in a way kids can understand. And it's packed with games and contests and activities at the back of the book that pull your family together for family time and reinforce the values in your kids' minds.
I love that Before we go, is there anything you'd like to leave the audience with.
I want to say thanks to all of the people out there who are not just sitting on the couch watching Fox News with their head and their crying in their Chick fil a soup. Don't do that. That's not helping. Pray. Put feet to your faith and get out there and do something. Take back your children's education first and foremost,
lead by example. And if you're looking for just something practical to do and you like what I've been doing with these public libraries, consider going to Brave books dot com and subscribe to the Book of the Month club. And what that will do is send a new book with a pro god pro America value to your front door, and you can read that to the children in your world. Maybe it's your kids, your grandkids, or maybe at your church or your public library, or your nieces or your nephews.
But that would be a great thing to do at bravebooks dot com.
And then where can people see your schedule? Because I know you're going to libraries, You're going to churches right now. So if someone wants to see, hey, is you going to be nearby, I want to go, you know, meet them, see them where can they kind of where can they find that?
The public of that I'm doing at libraries are posted at Brave books dot com, So you can go there, you can get a book, you can get my book for free when you subscribe, and you can check out the calendar. We'll be in Houston, Texans next then we're going out to Louden County in Virginia, and after that we're going to have a really special event in the middle of the summer which is going to be at libraries all across the country.
Well, wonderful.
I know my parents recently saw you speak at a church. You spoke out in Virginia, so they're very they're very excited that that I was interviewing you. So and you're kind to tell me to tell them that you said hi, so they'll be excited about that.
We got to score points with moms, with mom and dad, you know, that's that's right, And they've done a lot for us, and so we always yeah solid whenever we can.
Well, it's kind of tough to raise, so I'm trying to really do my.
Best to pay it back to them. I was a little bit of a stubborn kid growing up if you could.
Have been so, yeah, I know me too, and you watch Growing Pains, I basically was Mike Severs. So yeah, my dad he went gray early because of me.
Yeah, So I'm trying to pay it back in any way I can.
Well, I think you're doing a great job. You can turn on podcast is awesome.
Thank you, Kirk. I really appreciate it and I appreciate you taking the time. Thanks so much.
All right, keep up the great work.
That was Kirk Cameron. Appreciate what he's doing, Appreciate his voice and all this. I want to thank you guys for listening to the show every Monday and Thursday, but you can listen throughout the week. I want to think John Cass, who my producer, for putting the show together. Please leave us a review, give us a rating on Apple Podcast. I love to look at those. Until next time,