Bill Gothard's Institute in Basic Life Principles

by Ron Henzel

In the beginning someone created the overhead projector. But if they’d have had any idea what Bill Gothard would do with it — who knows? — they might have hesitated to market it. (Okay, maybe not ...)

It’s probably somewhat of an overstatement to say that Bill Gothard is to the overhead (and more recently video and the Web) what the apple was to the Garden of Eden. But it’s no exaggeration to say that he has skillfully manipulated visual media to sidetrack thousands of people into a warped view of the Bible and Christianity.

Gothard’s organization was set up from the start to promote him as an expert on virtually every aspect of the Christian life. He founded it as a seminar ministry under the name “Institute in Basic Youth Conflicts” (IBYC), and eventually expanded it to include literature distribution, home schooling, an “emergency resource team,” a “log cabin program,” an orphan program, a prison outreach, a “medical training institute,” an alleged law school, a “character curriculum” for public schools, a form of post-secondary education through his Advanced Training Institute, and several “training centers” scattered around the United States and overseas. Through these training centers Gothard has added the title of real estate mogul to his résumé by snapping up large buildings at bargain-basement prices.

For those who want to opt out as far as possible from participation in the world around them Gothard has constructed his own cradle-to-grave (or womb-to-tomb) spiritual environment — an alternate reality with its own jargon, customs and institutions. In his culturally monastic Christian utopian vision, large homeschooling families abstain from television, midwives are more important than doctors, traditional dating is forbidden, unmarried adults are “under the authority of their parents” and live with them, divorced people can’t remarry under any circumstance, and music has hardly changed at all since the late 19th century.

Meanwhile, the backbone of IBLP continues to be the seminar ministry, even though Gothard’s declining fortunes have reduced it to a shadow of its former self. Nevertheless, that is where the “basic principles” that undergird everything he teaches are promoted. In fact, a good deal of what Gothard passes off as “education” is not a whole lot more than repetitions of, or enhancements to, the material he’s been reciting to seminar attendees since the late 1960s.

Since the mid-1960s more than 2.5 million people have attended Bill Gothard’s Basic Seminar, which was once a true phenomenon in American evangelicalism, packing out major auditoriums across the country and raking in millions upon millions of dollars. IBLP refers to past attendees as “alumni,” in keeping with the image of “educator” (read: “guru”) that Gothard seeks to project for himself. The “Basic Seminar” is the ground-floor of indoctrination into IBLP, and “alumni” are encouraged to attend it many more times (free of charge after initial attendance) so its content can become fully ingrained in their thinking, to the exclusion of any alternative viewpoints other Christian teachers might present.

Gothard’s watershed teaching, laid down from the very beginning of his Basic Seminar, is his “umbrella of authority” doctrine, which adds many unscriptural twists and turns to what the Bible teaches about submission to authority. It also serves to help prop up Gothard’s “guru” status among his followers.

According to Gothard, his position as head of the Institute in Basic Life Principles (IBLP) in the Chicago suburb of Oak Brook, Illinois, places his employees in God’s “chain of command” under him. As his employees’ “spiritual authority” he advises them that his teachings are the result of a special leading from the Holy Spirit (i.e., a direct “pipeline to God,” as it were).

Gothard and his staff have been quite successful in exporting this elitist attitude to thousands of devoted followers around the world. IBLP literature is filled with references to “forgotten truths” and “overlooked requirements” for the Christian life that most churches have failed to practice, but which he has supposedly “rediscovered” and “restored.” Most of these special “insights” cannot withstand the close scrutiny of careful and responsible biblical interpretation. But that fact does not deter Gothard’s hardcore followers, most of whom use his teachings as a yardstick to measure their own pastors, and display an eagerness to split their churches over nit-picking compliance with IBLP precepts.

Gothard has an invincible belief in not only the correctness but also the absolute necessity of his opinions, regardless of how many Christian leaders, Bible scholars and theologians are lined up against him. He also projects an enormous assurance of his own personal righteousness, even when the evidence against him is piled so high it threatens to interfere with commercial airline traffic.

These attitudes and attributes have helped him weather a major sex scandal and related litigation, abandonment by many Christian leaders as his teachings took a turn for the even-more-weird, and a nosedive in attendance at his once-fabled Basic Seminars. Whereas at one time the seminars could attract capacity crowds to major indoor sports arenas even twice in the same year, now they can hardly fill all the seats in local church auditoriums.

Gothard blames this on his opposition to all Rock-and-Roll music, which he extends to all contemporary Christian music. He would have us believe that many of his former supporters found his stand on this issue unpalatable. But Gothard announced his opposition to modern music more than a decade before the popularity of his Basic Seminar began to decline. The truth he doesn’t seem to want to face is that many churches began withdrawing support for him when the sex scandal began making news in the early 1980s, and the exodus only accelerated as his teachings became more aberrant.

All this has brought him to a point where many observers wonder if he is preparing his thousands of followers to leave their churches and form a separate denomination centered around his materials. He’s already published what amounts to his own “liturgy” (i.e., order of service) that he expects truly “faithful” churches to utilize, and he encourages his followers to complain to their local church leaders if they deviate from Gothard’s teachings — most especially if they allow contemporary Christian music into their worship services.

So stay tuned. The most eventful phase of Gothard’s career may be just around the corner ...

Currently Available Media Coverage:

Previously Available Media Coverage:

The following stories are no longer available at their original locations on the web, but copies may be available upon request. Please check with the story’s source.

March 17, 2002, The Indianapolis Star: “Using faith to reform young offenders,“ opinion column by Russ Pulliam.
March 16, 2002, The Indianapolis Star: “Atheist Group Denounces Aid to Faith-Based Effort.”
February 25, 2002, MSNBC.com: “City holds back ITC funding.”
February 5, 2002, The Indianapolis Star: “Treatment that girl received at center now under review.”
February 4, 2002, MSNBC.com: “Child Protective Services investigating training center.”
Week of February 4, 2002, WTHR TV, Channel 13 Indianapolis (NBC Affiliate): “Indianapolis Training Center Series.”

Articles from the Midwest Christian Outreach Journal:

Articles from “A Tree-Hugger’s Apologetics Reader:”

Responses from Bill Gothard:

“Bill Gothard Thanks His Critics,” at the IBLP web site.

Articles from
Various Other Sources:

Articles on
Other Web Sites:

Bill Gothard’s
Web Sites: