Founder: Dr. James C. Dobson
President/Chief Executive Officer: James D. Daly
Established: 1977
Finances: $137,848,520 (2004 Focus on the Family revenue); $24,988,036 (2004 Focus on the Family Action revenue)

Principal Activities

• Focus on the Family's mission is to cooperate with the Holy Spirit in disseminating the Gospel of Jesus Christ to as many people as possible, and, specifically, to accomplish that objective by helping to preserve traditional values and the institution of the family.

• Focus on the Family (FOF) is the largest international religious-right group in the United States, a multi-media empire that includes its own "campus" and zip code in Colorado Springs, Colorado.

• FOF is a strong supporter of the Defense of Marriage Act; since the decision of Massachusetts to recognize same-sex unions, FOF closely monitors the status of same-sex marriage prevention measures being enacted in each state across the country.

• Focus on the Family Action launched an ad campaign in 16 states urging calls to U.S. senators in support of an up-or-down vote on President Bush's judicial nominees.

• FOF provides "Evangelical Christian" self-help in a variety of forums, via radio and their publications, and by conducting seminars across the country to help evangelical Christians become involved in the political process. Focus on the Family uses its radio show and magazine, Citizen, to urge "pro-family" voters to become active in state and local primaries and caucuses.

• FOF is anti-choice, anti-gay, and against sex education curricula that are not strictly abstinence-only. Local schoolbook censors frequently use Focus on the Family's material when challenging a book or curriculum in the public schools. FOF also focuses on religion in public schools, encouraging Christian teachers to establish prayer groups in schools.

• FOF supports student-led prayer in public schools, although it points out that it doesn't support teacher-led prayer for fear that a teacher would encourage Christian students "to pray to Allah, Buddha or the goddess Sophia against the wishes of the parents and/or students." ("Religion in Public Schools," February 1998.)

• FOF also supports private school vouchers, tax credits for religious schools, rejects education efforts that address multiculturalism or homosexuality, and recommends that Christian parents withdraw from the Parents and Teachers Association (PTA) on the grounds that it has a liberal social agenda. FOF supports faith-based social services and "charitable choice."

• FOF works against "special rights" for homosexuals and hate crime legislation, and supports "reparative therapy" for homosexuality, which has been widely discredited and rejected by the vast majority of doctors and physicians. FOF sponsors "Love Won Out," conferences held around the U.S. that claim to prove that "homosexuality is preventable and treatable," where many of the speakers are "ex-gays." "Love Won Out" is from the title of a book by John Paulk, an "ex-gay" who is the host of the conferences and is an employee of Focus on the Family.

• For those ex-gays who cannot change, FOF considers sexual celibacy another option. FOF regularly asserts the idea that there is a "homosexual agenda" and associates homosexuals with pedophilia and recruitment of children as sex partners.

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