Robert G. Grant (born 1936) is an American

political activist A political movement is a collective attempt by a group of people to change government policy or social values. Political movements are usually in opposition to an element of the status quo, and are often associated with a certain ideology. Some ...

, and the former leader of several

Christian right The Christian right, or the religious right, are Christian political factions characterized by their strong support of socially conservative and traditionalist policies. Christian conservatives seek to influence politics and public policy with ...

groups in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country Continental United States, primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., ...

. He is considered by many the "father" of the Christian Right in the US. He served as the chairman of Christian Voice, "the nation’s oldest conservative Christian lobby", and the

American Freedom Coalition The Family Federation for World Peace and Unification, widely known as the Unification Church, is a new religious movement, whose members are called Unificationists, or " Moonies". It was officially founded on 1 May 1954 under the name Holy ...

Early life

Grant earned a B.A. in History from

Wheaton College Wheaton College may refer to: * Wheaton College (Illinois), a private Christian, coeducational, liberal arts college in Wheaton, Illinois * Wheaton College (Massachusetts) Wheaton College is a private liberal arts college in Norton, Massachus ...

, Wheaton, Illinois; Bachelor of Divinity and Master of Divinity from

Fuller Theological Seminary Fuller Theological Seminary is an interdenominational Evangelical Christian seminary in Pasadena, California, with regional campuses in the western United States. It is egalitarian in nature. Fuller consistently has a student body that compr ...

in Pasadena, California; and Doctor of Philosophy from the

California Graduate School of Theology The California Graduate School of Theology is an institution of higher learning in Garden Grove, California. History The California Graduate School of Theology was founded and chartered in the state of California in 1969 by William S. McBirnie, ...

. He was also awarded a diploma from the St. Paul Bible College in

St. Paul, Minnesota Saint Paul (abbreviated St. Paul) is the capital of the U.S. state of Minnesota and the county seat of Ramsey County. Situated on high bluffs overlooking a bend in the Mississippi River, Saint Paul is a regional business hub and the center o ...

Political activism

Concerned about what he saw as moral decay in America, Grant founded American Christian Cause in Southern California in 1974 to fight against pornography and homosexual rights. In 1978, he relocated to Washington, D.C. and founded Christian Voice, the first major Christian Right organization in America. Grant quickly built Christian Voice, recruiting over 107,000 dues paying members including nearly 37,000 pastors. Grant involved national conservative leaders in his movement, including Gary Jarmin, Howard Phillips, Terry Dolan, and

Richard Viguerie Richard Art Viguerie (; born September 23, 1933) is an American conservative figure, pioneer of political direct mail and writer on politics. He is the current chairman of ConservativeHQ.com. Life and career Viguerie was born in Golden Acres ...

. Christian Voice-backed candidates included

Ronald Reagan Ronald Wilson Reagan ( ; February 6, 1911June 5, 2004) was an American politician, actor, and union leader who served as the 40th president of the United States from 1981 to 1989. He also served as the 33rd governor of California from 1967 ...

Steve Symms Steven Douglas Symms (born April 23, 1938) is an American politician and lobbyist who served as a four-term congressman (1973–81) and two-term U.S. Senator (1981–93), representing Idaho. He is a partner at Parry, Romani, DeConcini & Symms, a ...

Dan Quayle James Danforth Quayle (; born February 4, 1947) is an American politician who served as the 44th vice president of the United States from 1989 to 1993 under President George H. W. Bush. A member of the Republican Party, Quayle served as a U.S. ...

, and

John East John East (died 1856) was a 19th-century Anglican clergyman and writer. At Oxford he was a friend of William Henry Havergal. He became: * Rector of Croscombe, Somerset (some of his earlier writings were published in Evesham, Worcestershire, Eve ...

defeated incumbents in the

1978 Events January * January 1 – Air India Flight 855, a Boeing 747 passenger jet, crashes off the coast of Bombay, killing 213. * January 5 – Bülent Ecevit, of CHP, forms the new government of Turkey (42nd government). * January 6 ...

and 1980 elections. Grant's group campaigned for the election of President

in the 1980 presidential election. After Phillips, Dolan, and Viguerie left several years later, they and

Jerry Falwell Jerry Laymon Falwell Sr. (August 11, 1933 – May 15, 2007) was an American Baptist pastor, televangelism, televangelist, and conservatism in the United States, conservative activist. He was the founding pastor of the Thomas Road Baptist Church, ...

formed a new Christian right organization, the

Moral Majority Moral Majority was an American political organization associated with the Christian right and Republican Party. It was founded in 1979 by Baptist minister Jerry Falwell Sr. and associates, and dissolved in the late 1980s. It played a key role in ...

. Similar groups subsequently founded included

Concerned Women for America Concerned Women for America (CWA) is a socially conservative, evangelical Christian Nonprofit organization, non-profit women's 501(c)_organization#501(c)(4), legislative action committee in the United States. Headquartered in Washington, D.C., W ...

American Coalition for Traditional Values The Traditional Values Coalition (TVC) was an American conservative Christian organization. It was founded in Orange County, California by Rev. Louis P. Sheldon to oppose LGBT rights. Sheldon's daughter, Andrea Sheldon Lafferty, was the execut ...

, and the Christian Coalition. Grant was the founding president of the American Freedom Coalition with

Ralph David Abernathy Ralph David Abernathy Sr. (March 11, 1926 – April 17, 1990) was an American civil rights activist and Baptist minister. He was ordained in the Baptist tradition in 1948. As a leader of the civil rights movement, he was a close friend and ...

. He is currently on the board of governors of the

Council for National Policy The Council for National Policy (CNP) is an umbrella organization and networking group for conservative and Republican activists in the United States. It was launched in 1981 during the Reagan administration by Tim LaHaye and the Christian rig ...

Media work

Grant appeared on ''

60 Minutes ''60 Minutes'' is an American television news magazine broadcast on the CBS television network. Debuting in 1968, the program was created by Don Hewitt and Bill Leonard, who chose to set it apart from other news programs by using a unique st ...

'', ''

Nightline ''Nightline'' (or ''ABC News Nightline'') is ABC News' late-night television news program broadcast on ABC in the United States with a franchised formula to other networks and stations elsewhere in the world. Created by Roone Arledge, the prog ...

'', ''

CBS CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS, the abbreviation of its former legal name Columbia Broadcasting System, is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainm ...

'', ''

NBC News NBC News is the news division of the American broadcast television network NBC. The division operates under NBCUniversal Television and Streaming, a division of NBCUniversal, which is, in turn, a subsidiary of Comcast. The news division's v ...

'', the ''

Morton Downey, Jr. Sean Morton Downey Jr. (December 9, 1932 – March 12, 2001) was an American television talk show host and actor who pioneered the "Tabloid talk show, trash TV" format in the late-1980s on his program ''The Morton Downey Jr. Show''. Early life ...

Show'', ''

Good Morning America ''Good Morning America'' (often abbreviated as ''GMA'') is an American morning television program that is broadcast on ABC. It debuted on November 3, 1975, and first expanded to weekends with the debut of a Sunday edition on January 3, 1993. ...

'', ''CBS Nightwatch'' and various local and national radio and television talk shows. He has been quoted in ''

Time Time is the continued sequence of existence and event (philosophy), events that occurs in an apparently irreversible process, irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various me ...

'', ''

Newsweek ''Newsweek'' is an American weekly online news magazine co-owned 50 percent each by Dev Pragad, its president and CEO, and Johnathan Davis (businessman), Johnathan Davis, who has no operational role at ''Newsweek''. Founded as a weekly print m ...

'', '' U.S. News & World Report'', ''

Washington Post ''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large na ...

'', ''

Christianity Today ''Christianity Today'' is an evangelical Christian media magazine founded in 1956 by Billy Graham. It is published by Christianity Today International based in Carol Stream, Illinois. ''The Washington Post'' calls ''Christianity Today'' "evan ...

'', and other publications. Grant has also worked as a radio

talk show A talk show (or chat show in British English) is a television programming or radio programming genre structured around the act of spontaneous conversation.Bernard M. Timberg, Robert J. Erler'' (2010Television Talk: A History of the TV Talk Sh ...

host, as the co-host of the television talk show ''Let Freedom Ring'', and on the publisher's council of ''

Conservative Digest Richard Art Viguerie (; born September 23, 1933) is an American conservative figure, pioneer of political direct mail and writer on politics. He is the current chairman of ConservativeHQ.com. Life and career Viguerie was born in Golden Acres, ...

'' Magazine, and is the publisher of '' American Freedom Journal''.

Pastoral work

Grant is an ordained

Baptist Baptists form a major branch of Protestantism distinguished by baptizing professing Christian believers only ( believer's baptism), and doing so by complete immersion. Baptist churches also generally subscribe to the doctrines of soul c ...

minister. He has worked in various ministerial positions, as the religion editor of ''

The Washington Times ''The Washington Times'' is an American conservative daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C., that covers general interest topics with a particular emphasis on national politics. Its broadsheet daily edition is distributed throughou ...

'', and has led over 125

pilgrimage A pilgrimage is a journey, often into an unknown or foreign place, where a person goes in search of new or expanded meaning about their self, others, nature, or a higher good, through the experience. It can lead to a personal transformation, aft ...

s to Israel. He was the founder of the

. He is a member of the Religious Roundtable. He was a founding chairman

Coalition for Religious Freedom The Coalition for Religious Freedom is a Christian religious right organization founded by Tim LaHaye and Robert Grant (Christian Leader), Robert Grant to lobby against government regulation of religion. In the 1980s the organization concentrated i ...

and the

, both with

Tim Lahaye Timothy Francis LaHaye (April 27, 1926 – July 25, 2016) was an American Baptist evangelical Christian minister who wrote more than 85 books, both fiction and non-fiction, including the ''Left Behind'' series of apocalyptic fiction, which h ...

. He founded the United Community Church of

Glendale, California Glendale is a city in the San Fernando Valley and Verdugo Mountains regions of Los Angeles County, California, United States. At the 2020 U.S. Census the population was 196,543, up from 191,719 at the 2010 census, making it the fourth-larges ...

Awards and recognition

* Shalom Award, Nation of

Israel Israel (; he, יִשְׂרָאֵל, ; ar, إِسْرَائِيل, ), officially the State of Israel ( he, מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, label=none, translit=Medīnat Yīsrāʾēl; ), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated ...

References

External links

* 1936 births Leaders of Christian parachurch organizations Fuller Theological Seminary alumni Living people California Republicans New Right (United States) {{US-reli-bio-stub