RADIOApril 04, 2024

Has the PERSECUTION of Christians Begun in America?

Christianity is no longer the dominant religion in America, “Pagan America” author John Daniel Davidson argues. Instead, we have started down the dark path of paganism. So, what will this “post-Christian era” look like? How long until Christians are persecuted in America? Has that already begun? And what can we do to turn this around? John Daniel Davidson joins Glenn to break it all down. Plus, he explains why “the idea that the future will be this secular, woke utopia is totally wrong.”

Transcript

Below is a rush transcript that may contain errors

John Daniel Davidson, pagan America, the decline of Christianity and the dark age to come.

Let me just tell you, there's a couple of signs of hope, and I would like John to address some of this as we go along. First of all, here's Donald Trump two days ago. Cut six.

DONALD: And what the hell was Biden thinking, when he declared Easter Sunday to be Trans Visibility Day? Such total disrespect to Christians.

And November 5th is going to be called something else. You know what it's going to be called?

Christian visibility day, when Christians turn out in numbers, that nobody has ever seen before.

GLENN: Then we also had this come out over the weekend.

Here's Richard Dawkins.

Very famous atheist.

An entrepreneur claiming Christianity, as his belief.

But listen to what he says.

VOICE: I do think, culturally, we are a Christian country. I call myself a Christian. I'm not a believer, but there's a distinction between being a believing Christian and being a cultural Christian. And so, you know, I love hymns and Christmas carols. And I -- I sort of feel at home, in the Christian ethos.

If I had to choose between Christianity and Islam, I choose Christianity, every single time.

I mean, it seems to me, to be a fundamentally decent religion.

In a way that I think Islam is not.

GLENN: Okay. Forget about the Islam part.

The culture of our country is based on Christianity.

So let's bring John in, about pagan America. We are a Christian nation. You believe that.

JOHN: I believe we were. I don't think we are now. I think we're entering a post-Christian era for America and for the West.

GLENN: So that kind of sounds bad. If you listen to Richard Dawkins.

JOHN: Yeah. Absolutely. Richard Dawkins should know better. You can't have the culture without the cult.

You can't have Christianity, as a cultural force. As a force that shapes the public square. And forms the character of the people. Without the actual religion behind it.

People who believe elsewhere, in that clip that you played.

He said, now, I understand that the number that believe in Christians are going down in this country, and I think that's a good thing.

What does he think will happen to all the cathedrals? And all the parish churches. They will turn into mosques. In the case of Britain, or apartments, or nightclubs.

GLENN: So what happens to us?

JOHN: We became pagan. And part of the claim of the book, is that there is really only one alternative to Christianity. Which is paganism.

Now, I don't mean that we will have temples to Zeus and Appollo popping up in Times Square, or a surge of witchcraft, although we are seeing that surge.

What I mean is that our public life, our communal life as a nation and a people is going to be defined by the pagan ethos, not the Christian ethos.

GLENN: Which, the pagan ethos, is what?

JOHN: Nothing is true. Everything is permitted. A radical subjectivity about man, about God. About our natures. About what we can become and what we can do.

And so what determines what public policy should be, or what determines what is right, isn't based on any universal claims about human nature.

Or the image of God. Man being created in the image of God.

It's based on force and coercion.

And that's how pagan societies have always been. That's why they're slave societies.

GLENN: So pagan societies in the 20th century.

Soviet Union. Germany.

JOHN: Post Christian. Yes. Yes. Exactly. Exactly.

And what were they characterized by?

Force. Coercion. A rejection of human nature. Rejection of the idea of human rights.

GLENN: So you're seeing that everywhere.

And this is what led you to the -- the idea that we're -- we're post-Christian.

Is there any way to turn it around?

JOHN: I don't think there's a way to turn it around in our lifetimes. Let's put it that way.

So I don't think that Christianity will be defeated in the end.

I'm a Roman Catholic, myself.

And so I believe in the permanency, of the church.

And of the Christian faith. And victory if the end.

But this is a general racial struggle.

It's been centuries now, that Christianity has been declining in the West, has really accelerated since the middle of the last century. And I don't think it will be turned around in our lifetimes. And maybe not in our children's lifetimes. But there are things that we can do to sort of preserve the flame, and rebuild amid the ruins.

GLENN: Like, what?

JOHN: Transmit the faith to our children, carve out spaces for our churches and communities.

And this is the important part. We don't retreat into those communities.

We find and fight on ground we can win.

That may mean moving out of large cities that are lost. And it also may mean getting involved at the local level to take back your school district.
Take back your library. Take back your city council. And, you know, bring the faith.

The Christian faith, back into the public square. Where it was for most of our history in the country.

GLENN: You know, I've been saying for a long time now.

I think it's really important that -- and I don't like this. Because I don't want to segregate us.

I don't want, you know, two separate Americas. But I think because of the battle that we're in right now, I think it's important to be in like-minded communities, especially religiously speaking. And I don't mean all of the same religion.

I mean, that they are Judeo-Christian, value-driven communities.

Because we -- we -- if you're not in that community, and you are not surrounded by the people with the same kind of ethics and ethos, you could very well be into a community, that goes wrong on either side. On either right or left.

And goes into darkness quickly. Do you agree with that?

GLENN: You also get lulled into a place of complacency. Right? Things are okay. It's not as bad as it seems.

You know, part of the arresting title and subtitle in the cover of the book, which has a burning church on it is to wake people up, to get people to accept, that this is happening. We're living in a post-Christian society.

Christianity is not going to be the dominant force in the public life of America, moving forward.

As it has been, as I said, for most of our history. We're going to become a pagan country. And that means the Christians are going to become a persecuted minority, as they always have been in pagan societies.

GLENN: Well, wouldn't you say we're already really kind of there.

It's not as bad, as it probably will be.

But we're already there. Look, if you're pro-life, you're toast. You know.

JOHN: Yeah. The number of things that you can't publicly disagree with or dispute is growing, seemingly by the week. Right?

You have to accept that Easter is really Trans Day of Visibility. You have to accept that abortion is a positive good, not just safe, legal, and rare. But it's a positive good. It's necessary to vindicate the rights of women.

You can't question gay marriage anymore. That ship sailed a long time ago. So these are things that are part of what I call the pagan morality, or the state morality of the new pagan regime.

And you're -- there is no dissent allowed on these things. Because dissent, tolerance in the public square, freedom of speech. That's a Christian virtue. That's a luxury that only a Christian society can afford.

GLENN: Has there been any pagan countries, that have lasted?

I mean, I know that Soviet Union, 80 years. But has there been any modern pagan, that just don't eat themselves.

JOHN: Well, no. And the thing that always happens to pagan societies, when they encounter Christianity, going back through history. Christianity is the only thing that breaks the pagan stranglehold on a people, across geography, across time, across cultures.

It was the encounter with Christianity, that broke these pagan societies. Because it proposed a radically new way of conceiving of man, and our relationship to God.

And one another. And how we should organize society.

And as Christianity retreats, that paganism. That pagan ethos, that is simmering, just below the surface. Is going to come back in modern forms. In modern iterations. As it did in Nazi Germany.

In the Soviet Union. And there were periods, where there was this illusion of like atheism and of secularism.

We're shedding that pretty quickly. The idea that the future is going to be the secular liberal utopia is totally wrong.

GLENN: I think wokism is a religion.

JOHN: Yes. It's a form of paganism.

GLENN: Yeah, it has its high priests.

You can easily be excommunicated. It has its rituals. It has things you must do and must never do. It's the opposite of Christianity. There is no forgiveness. Even the high priests can't forgive you, unless you bow down to them.

JOHN: And then only maybe.

GLENN: Then only maybe, depending on who you are. It's so clearly a religion.

Why -- why call it paganism instead of wokism?

JOHN: Because I think wokism, just like atheism, or communism, is a species of paganism.

And that when you really dig into what paganism is. And how it works. What we're seeing is a resurgence of paganism in a modern context.

Part of it is a vocabulary problem. We're not going to talk about the dogs in the same that ancient pre-Christian peoples talked about the gods.

But we are seeing a growing acceptance in the idea of spiritual forces.

A movement away from pure materialist secular scientistic kind of thinking, that denies all supernatural reality. That denies all spiritual reality, especially among young people right now.

This admixture of being secular on the one hand, in rejecting organized religion, but being open to spiritual forces. And things like identity that are really beyond reason. Or I would say, a disfigurement of reason.

Which is another hallmark of a pagan society, and we see that everywhere now.

GLENN: So you -- you saying these things. It would be really easy for the left to say, ah! You want -- you're a Christian nationalist.

You want a Christian country, that is run by the church. How do you respond to Christian nationalism?

JOHN: Well, it would be great if it were true. The funny thing about the Christian nationalist debate. As I sort of -- the argument in my book, kind of lays out, is that it's the opposite of the case. We're not becoming a Christian nationalist country.

I don't even know what that he's not.

I think what they mean by that. They don't want Christianity to have any influence on our national life and on the public square, as was the case for our entire history up until the middle of the last century.

But the idea that Christian nationalists are somehow ascendent, or the Christians are somehow gaining power and influence in the United States is a joke.

And when you look at the demographic data and you look at the decline in church affiliation and church attendance, you look at how --

GLENN: It's plummeting.

JOHN: Yeah, on every metric across the board, so it's a weird argument to make when Christianity has never been weaker in the United States.

GLENN: But there is. There are those that do want. I mean, they're very fringe, fringe, fringe.

But they do want a religious state.

And that -- I don't think that's what you would want, when you said, it would be great, if it were true.

I don't think it would be great, if it were true.

I want the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. But I want the people to -- to regulate themselves, and, you know, as -- as Franklin and Jefferson said, the -- the best way to regulate yourself is through religion. Through Christianity.

JOHN: Yeah. Well, you have John Adams' famous line that our Constitution was meant for only a moral and religious people. It's unfit for any other.

But, you know, it really is true, that, you know, Remi Brague, the French philosopher said in the 1990s, talking about Europe.

The European civilization is, you know, a product, not of calculation, but of faith. So you need actual Christian belief.

You know, contra Richard Dawkins. You can't just have the principles.

They rely as their source of vitality on an act of faith among the people. So if we actually had a critical mass of believing, practicing Christians in this country, we would have things like free speech, tolerance, an open public square, human rights, and respect for everybody.

The things that are disappearing right now, under an ascendant and emerging pagan regime.

GLENN: The name of the book is Pagan America: The Decline of Christianity and The Dark Age to Come.

I just want to hold you over for a second longer because it's a little dark.

And I would like to see the hope in all of it. We'll that do in just a second. Let's say you had to spend 1 dollar every second of every hour, day after day, month after month, year after year.

How long would it be, before you could spend a trillion dollars? 36 thousand years!

We're spending and borrowing and printing $1 trillion every 100 days. That is an art form in and of itself for a country to be able to spend that kind of money. My gosh.

What are we buying?

I hope we all get yachts!

It is not hard to see, where we are headed with our economy and the US dollar. Please, don't have all of your money in US dollars. Please, land.

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(music)

GLENN: You know, I hear from people all the time, well, it's never going to get that bad.
It's never been like that. It's never going to get that bad.

Clearly, not true, John.

We're in a different place than we have ever been before. So give me some hope. What can be done?

JOHN: The last chapter of the book, is titled the Boniface Option, and it's a loving dig at Rogers. The Benedict Option, which came out in 2016.

And one of the things that they argued for, was to build up your local communities, your local churches, your home schools, your family communities.

And sort of build an ark to survive the storms to come. And one of the things I push back on a little bit with is the idea that we can just build arks and kind of hunker down and survive.

We have to push forward. And we have to push Christianity out back into the public square, where it was.

And where it belongs. As a testament to the faith.

I think there's hope in this sense.

As people she had their sort of strict material worldview. And are open to the idea of spiritual forces.

There's an opportunity for Christians to proclaim their faith, publicly again. And proclaim it to a people who maybe are more open, than they were a generation ago.

When secular liberalism seemed triumphant.

And it seemed like the future was going to be this atheist, cold, rationalistic world.

That's not the world that is emerging right now.

And so there's real -- there's real battles to fight. With real spiritual forces. And Christians need to sort of put on their armor, and get ready to fight with their faith. By like I said earlier, taking back your schools. Taking back your city halls. Taking back your towns.

But also being able to proclaim the faith, publicly. And pay a cost for it. Right?

There's a long period in this country, where Christians and the state were kind of on the same side. And Christians enjoyed a kind of deference and privilege that they didn't through much of our history.

That's coming to an end, and we need to wrap our minds around it. We need to steel our nerves, and we need to take heart in the truth of our faith and the succor and the strength that it gives us.

GLENN: And that only begets stronger Christians.

Stronger people of faith. When they really have to struggle. That's our problem. We haven't had to struggle with our faith for so long.

Yeah. Sure. I believe in God. You wouldn't say it, out loud, many times.

But now that you're starting to be pushed, you're seeing more and more people, talk about it, openly.

Thank you so much for being in here. It's pagan America. The decline of Christianity, and the dark age to come. John Daniel Davidson

The ONE “forever war” Glenn Beck supports

This Fourth of July, Glenn Beck reveals the only “forever war” he supports. It’s the war Americans have been fighting since our nation’s founding, and we must continue the fight…

Transcript

Below is a rush transcript that may contain errors

GLENN: Two hundred forty-nine years ago, I think it is tomorrow. Right? Is tomorrow the second, or is it the first?

What day is it today?

So it was 200 -- 249 years ago, tomorrow, that somebody sat alone, in a -- in a one-room hotel room.

And scratched out the words, when in the course of human events. Those are the first six words of a document that is so dangerous!

Still today, so revolutionary.

It was whispered in those candle lit rooms by men who knew. Knew. That if I signed this document, that's a death warrant.

I'm dead!

I'm dead.

But in the course of human events, shh.

Jefferson wrote them!

33 years old. Adams would later say, you do well to revere Jefferson. But he didn't write alone. Basically, I was there too.

And so was Ben Franklin. The ideas were forged in the minds of men like Franklin, who is old enough to know better. And Adams, who was stubborn enough, not to care. And they weren't perfect men. But I love this about the left. They try to make you think.

That you think are perfect. I don't think they were perfect! I mean, Ben Franklin used to walk around naked in his house a lot. That shows, I mean, for as smart as that guy was. It shows, maybe he had a lack of mirrors. But they weren't perfect!

They owned slaves. They argued. They compromised.

How does that make them different than us?
I mean, we should be able to relate to them!

What is it that we tolerate right now?
What is it that we compromise on?

What is it -- what are our failures that future generations are going to go, these people just didn't get it? Perhaps what we should notice is that they, unlike most of us. They were willing to gamble their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor.

For something that had never, ever been done before. Something entirely new!

The idea that rights don't come from a government, or from a king, or from a parliament.

They don't come from the majority voting. Everyone has certain rights.

You know, for all these people who are, you know -- going in Macy's, and burning down towns. And then stealing clothing. And they're like, because I've been oppressed!

And you can't -- I've got rights, you know.
Yeah. Yeah.

You know who the first people were, to articulate those rights?

You know the only country that actually has stood for those rights?

And we're imperfect!

That idea came from the Founders, that you say you hate.

But the actual rights come from God, which you dismiss!

Think of this. Just ponder this for a second.

That all men are created equal! That their rights are given to them, by a creator.

It's not a political assertion. It's a genius. That's eternal truth!

That's theological dynamite, lobbed straight in to the thrones of Europe.

All over the world, it's still dynamite.

They knew what they were doing.

And I don't mean like, they knew what they were doing.

They had it. No. They knew that the British crown had the largest military force in the world. And these guys, they were farmers. They were printers. They were lawyers. They were a ragtag collection of intellectual and idealists, facing down an empire, where they said, the sun never set on the British empire. Meaning, the colonialism was everywhere!

You could not escape England. And yet, they declared it. We're leaving, without apology!

And they said that when a government becomes destructive of the ends of liberty, life, and the pursuit of happiness, it's not only the right of the people, it's their duty to throw it off!

Wow. And you know what is amazing? That's not rebellion.

That's -- that's not revolution. That's -- that's responsibility.

That -- that kind of language today, that would have you flagged, shadow banned. Labeled an extremist. In most countries, disappeared!

But that is the foundation of what we call America. The American experiment. And it's that. The American experiment.

And it's just that, an experiment. We didn't know if we could get it right. And we haven't gotten it right. But isn't it worth experimenting?

Isn't it worth trying to get that concept right?

When you fail on that concept, you're like, eh. That's a stupid idea.

That's not a stupid idea. That's the greatest idea of all time.

Why are so many people willing to just quit?

The experiment is self-rule. It's not perfect.

Never has been. Slavery. Jim Crow. Internment camps. Assassinations.

My God! Forgive us, for what we have done.

But at the same time, what nation has done more to correct its own errors?

What people have shed more blood, not for conquest, but for freedom.

Twice in the last century, we crossed oceans. Not to claim territory. But to liberate that territory!

Our sons and daughters fought and bled on foreign soil to push the darkness back, to fight against Naziism and fascism and Communism. And here we are. Here we are today.

After 249 years tomorrow of that experiment, standing at the lip of the very abyss, those men feared.

A godless chaos, rising in the east and a cold atheistic utopia, clawing at the foundations of the Western world. Islamism and Communism, two ideologies that have killed tens of millions of people. Now dressed all in new robes, selling old lies.

And we can't even teach a child where their rights come from. We have replaced Jefferson and Adams with TikTok influencers and bureaucratic groupthink.

We're raising generations to not even know the truth about their own identity.

But to question their identity. And they could be, oh, you're a funny, funny colored unicorn today. What do you want to be tomorrow?

We don't teach them anything about truth, or their inheritance, most importantly. Their inheritance. What good are hot dogs and fireworks, if the soul of the nation is up for auction? What is the meaning in Fourth of July, if we have forgotten the why? If we don't even call it Independence Day anymore. Most people don't even know who we fought against for independence.

They think we fought for its independence! Most people think we fought the South!

And yet, we'll light the sparklers, or blow our fingers off, because we're just that stupid.

This Independence Day weekend, would you do me and yourself and your country a favor, and read the words out loud. Speak the words out loud.

When in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands, which have connected them with one another.

And to assume among the powers of earth, the separate, but equal station, to which the laws of nature.

And nature's God entitle them.

A decent respect to the opinions of mankind, requires that they should declare the causes, which impair them to the separation.

What are they saying?

Look, we want to be decent people.

We want to be decent people.

And we have to separate them.

But we believe it's only right that we tell you why we have to separate. And it's not because of all the bad things you've done. We'll get to those later. It's because we're different. And you don't understand. You have been telling us all of these things, we no longer believe in. We hold these truths to be self-evident. That all men are created equal, and they're endowed by their creator with certain inalienable. Unchangeable rights.

And just among these, are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

That to secure these rights, government are his instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.

My gosh. Read those words. And let your children hear what thinking and courage sounds like.

That to secure these rights, I'm telling you, the king, who thinks that your government was given to you, by God.

And you are the ruler.

And you will tell everybody what to think, what to do. What to buy. What to sell. What to tax. What not to tax. Who gets land. Who doesn't get land.

No, no, no. Government are his instituted among men, deriving their powers, their just powers, from the people. And that government is only there, established by those men to protect the rights that God has given each of those men.

Let them feel the chill, that runs down the spine, when Jefferson writes, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the government, or from the governed. Let them hear the words, of -- of responsibility. What responsibility sounds like, with courage and freedom. That whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these rights, it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it.

And to institute a new government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to affect their a lot of and happiness.

In other words, you have the right, you have the responsibility to stop tyrants. And if the government has gone bad, to throw that government off.

But reconstitute a government, that will do a better job at protecting those rights. Not to form a communist government.

Not to do anything else. But you want a new government?

Fine! Let's find the way to make men more free. This is not a metaphor. This is a declaration of war on tyranny in all of its forms.

I mean, I said, yesterday, freedom isn't free.

It was paid for by somebody's blood. But you have to remember, they paid for their freedom, not for our freedom, necessarily.

We -- there comes a time, we have to pay for our freedom. And God forbid, that it comes down to blood.

But at least shake off the apathy. We -- we must renew this promise of this experiment of America.

We need to fight for it as well. An out-of-control government that seeks to rope us into forever wars, over and over again. We're all against forever wars. I'm against it.

I hate them.

But there is one forever war, that is required in a free society. A different kind of forever war.

A war against ourselves, a war against human nature in each of us. Because of human nature, we get fat. We get lazy.

We get tolerant of abuses. Let your children hear you speak these words. And when you speak them, ponder them yourself.

Prudence, indeed, will dictate, that governments long established, should not be changed for light and transient causes.

And accordingly, all experience has shown, that mankind is more disposed to suffer while the evils are sufferable than to right themselves, by abolishing the forms in which they're accustomed.

But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object, evinces a sign to reduce them under absolute despotism.

It's their right. It's their duty. To throw off such government. And provide new guards for such future security.

In one paragraph, we make the point twice. And they tell us, look, we've studied people.

We know you're going to get fat and lazy and apathetic. And you won't want to do stuff for transient causes. Because this is really not good.

But when push comes to shove. And everything is moving towards absolute despotism. Absolute tyranny. Then you must stand up.

I ask you to ponder this. This particular part, when a long train of abuses and usurpations. Prudence will indeed dictate that governments long established should not be exchanged for light and transient causes.

And accordingly, all experience has shown, that mankind is more disposed to suffer while the evils suffer, than to right themselves.

Aren't we exactly the same people, that their experience was talking about?

Aren't we the people that are more disposed to suffer, than to right ourselves? Because we're too comfortable. Or we're too afraid, just to stand up and simply say no to lies.

No!

There is a difference between men and women.

No! Communism is to be feared. It's killed over 100 million people, in the last 100 years.

No!

Muslims aren't bad. Islamism is!

It's evil. No!

You can peacefully protest, any time, any place. And I will fight to the death for your right to do that.

But when you start burn cities down to the ground, no!

We're just a few days away. And we have marked our 249th birthday. Maybe. Just maybe, this year, can we stop asking what America was, and start deciding what America will be?

Where it just slips quietly into history. In the dark of apathy and ignorance.

Because the only thing more dangerous than tyranny is the people who have forgotten what it took to break its chains.

THE GLENN BECK PODCAST

We need REAL jobs in America — Trump should do THIS now!

It is clear we need to create more productive, high-paying jobs for American citizens. But that doesn't mean bringing back the same exact jobs of the past in massive numbers. It means creating and supporting jobs of the present and future that will better the lives of Americans. Glenn Beck and Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts break down exactly what this entails and how President Trump can make it a reality.

Watch Glenn Beck's FULL Interview with Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts HERE

The most INCREDIBLE World War II story you’ve NEVER HEARD

One of the biggest American World War II cemeteries in Europe is in a small town in the Netherlands, where thousands of Dutch people continue the tradition to this day of “adopting” a fallen US soldier and checking in on his family. “The Monuments Man” author Robert Edsel joins Glenn Beck to tell this incredible story, which he documents in his new book, “Remember Us.”

Transcript

Below is a rush transcript that may contain errors

GLENN: Robert, welcome back to the program. How are you, sir?

ROBERT: Great to talk to you!

GLENN: It's great to talk to you.

Can you remind me? You were on with us, after Monuments Men. And you talked about this great service that is still going on, where people that -- they were still looking for paintings and pieces of art, that had been taken by the Nazis.

And if I remember right, didn't somebody in our -- our own audience reach out to you, and say, I think we found one of those paintings?

ROBERT: Yes, sir. Absolutely.

The Glenn Beck audience. And Glenn Beck, you yourself deserve a lot of credit.

Because I hadn't walked out of your studio last time. You know, in Dallas at Las Colinas.

Headed back to our office at Monuments Men and Women Foundation office, before someone in my office contacted me and said, we've already had a lead, as a result of your interview with Glenn. And it turned out someone whose aunt had been given two paintings during World War II.

She had worked for the government overseeing Germany, and these two paintings were missing.

We were able to identify who the rightful owner was, and get them back.

So it's a great thing that you performed. And, you know, it's a magnificent conclusion, though obviously a very difficult part of history.

GLENN: What was it like to give that back to the family?

ROBERT: It was a deeply moving experience. We -- the foundation found and returned more than 30 works of art, from paintings to documents, ancient books. Tapestries, to museums. Individual collectors, and so on.

And, you know, when we see, oftentimes, the people just stand there, and they cry.

They don't even know what to say. Because they may have worked 50 or 60 years, trying to find some work of art that's been missing. And they haven't had leads. And to -- to see us standing there, with something that belongs to them.

Not asking for anything in return. Don't charge anybody for doing it. Because we feel like everybody who went through World War II already paid enough.

Words -- words just fail. It's just pure gratitude.

GLENN: I can't wait for you to tell this new story.

Tell me the story of the care takers. The care takers of --

ROBERT: Well, it's a story that found me, just as Monuments did.

I have written about -- in the Monuments Men, I told the story of two Monuments Officers who were killed in combat, one British soldier and one American, Walter Huchthausen. And Huchthausen was killed. He once did a last casualty at war. He was killed in the last month of World War II, and is buried in the American benevolence, American cemetery, in Margraten in the Netherlands. I knew that story, and I had made mention of a young girl who was harbored in September '45, asking for the address of his mother, wanting to write her and tell her, that she walked 5 miles, several times a week, from her house to the American military cemetery. It was called then. To put flowers on his grave. Because her family knew them. And they were grief-stricken to know that they were killed.

And I knew that story too. I mentioned that. And then in 2015, the nephew of Huchthausen wrote me and included a photograph of this elderly lady with this crown of white hair. And he said, here's a photo with Frida, and I couldn't place who this was.

I had no idea who it was. And I realized, my God, this is that 19-year-old girl that is still alive. So I flew to England. She married a British soldier after the war. And I went to meet with her. She started showing me photographs of when the American -- Americans liberated her area of the Netherlands.

And all these American soldiers that they knew.

And she said, you know about the American military cemetery.

She said, have you been there?

And I said yes. And she said, so you know about the great adoption program?

And I said, what? She said, the great adoption program.

I said, I have no idea what you're talking about. So I started doing some research on this. And learned, at the end of World War II, our largest World War II cemetery in Europe, was not Normandy. It was the Netherlands American cemetery, where 17,800 boys and a few women buried at this cemetery by May 1946.

And by that time, every single grave had a Dutch person, a local person, who volunteered to be an adaptor of that brave.

Go out there on the first death date of the soldier, Veterans Day, Memorial Day.

And if they had the contact information for the next of kin, send them a photograph of the grave.
And a letter.

Because they realized, it was okay to adopt the bodies of dead boys.

But where the real need was, was to reach across the ocean, into the American homes and try to assuage the grief of the families.

And they knew some of these boys. And I found it the most heartwarming, uplifting, and certainly unique conclusion to a World War II story that I think has been written.

GLENN: So are they still some of them still doing this?

ROBERT: Not some. In fact, there were about -- in 1940, 748.

American families were given the choice to have their loved ones sent home, or to be left overseas in a military cemetery.

The Army had no idea, how many -- how many families would want their boys sent home, and as a consequence, they couldn't tell how many cemeteries they would need.

We thought almost everybody would want to have the families sent home. But it turned out not to be the case. So about 61 percent came home. About 39 percent stayed in Europe, which was about the numbers from World War I.

Although, the numbers in this area, in the Netherlands were higher.

The -- the graves that are there now.

There are 10,000 boys there. And four women.

8300 graves. 1700 names on the walls of the missing.

Every one of them has an adaptor for 80 years.

All those graves have been adopted, without interruption.

There's a waiting list of almost a thousand people in the Netherlands, to become a doctor. This is a -- not just a --

GLENN: This is --

JASON: A privilege. Because they take their kids out to the cemetery. They turn the cemetery into a classroom. And you go out there. And, yes, there's a somber element. They're instilling in their kids, you're able to think, and say what you want to. Because of the freedom that was given to you, by this American girl or boy. And we don't do that in our country anymore.

GLENN: So this is one of the most incredible stories that I've -- I've ever heard.

And I'm shocked that the world doesn't know this!

Is -- have you -- is there anything like this, anywhere else in the world?

JASON: No. We couldn't even find a comp of any nature.

There are -- that is not to say, the people in Normandy area, don't care about Normandy and other cemeteries. They do, of course. As do the Belgians in other cemeteries.

But there's no place that created an organic great adoption program, during the war, in January 1945!

These people in this area of the Netherlands were so grateful, having been neutral in World War I.

And having not lost their freedom for 100 years!

And they didn't like it!

And when the Americans liberated them in September 44. I'll never forget this woman Freda. This elderly woman I met, looked at me, the first time I interviewed her. I knew her for eight years. The last eight years of her life.

I delivered a eulogy two summers ago. She looked at me, there were the eyes of the 19-year-old. And she said, when I saw that first tank over the hill and I realized, we were saved.

I looked at my dad, and I said, Papi, these American boys come all the way across the ocean to say this. And there were tears in her eyes.

Because they didn't -- they couldn't imagine how we could have moved that equipment across -- across the ocean.

And why we would have cared so much.

So there isn't anything like it.

But January 45, these people in this little town of Margraten.

A mile from the cemetery, organized a meeting of the town leaders. The town who got 1200 people.

And they were trying to find an answer to the question: How do you thank your liberators, when they're no longer alive to thank? And they came up with this idea of this great adoption program, and it's a story that I tell, following the lives of about 12 different American combat soldiers.

Bomber recipients.

Tankers.

Because we don't know that story.

We don't what knows to an American story, when they're killed on the field of battle.

Because it's depressing.

We move on to the next scene in a movie.

Well, I want people to know, you started your program with freedom is not free.

It's ugly.

Let's talk about that. Let's talk about what the cost is.

Let's talk about the stripping line that the body goes through, and the removal of dog tags, one being put in the mouth, if there's still a head. And the other being nailed to the cross, because they don't have time to stencil the names on yet.

Let's talk about that, and let people know, it's not just a Marvel movie. Or a gang war.

This is real. This is painful. And, of course, at the end of the war, when we Americans declare victory, and move on with our lives, there's millions of family members in the United States, whose lives will never be the same.

So it is -- it's still happening today. It's still happening today.

GLENN: The name -- the name of the book is Remember Us.

And take us -- I mean, because that's really kind of the -- the -- the beauty of it.

Take us through the rest of the book, just briefly.

It starts with what?

ROBERT: Well, I follow -- I began what a nice life was in the Netherlands. Until May 10, 1940.

And the Netherlands does not get much attention from World War II, and yet everybody has heard of Battle of the Bulge. And Battle -- those are all within 50 miles of what we're talking about.

They happened around there. Of course, World War II, in western Europe, begins right here in this area. Because the German tanks roll across the border.

So I cover the life of these 12 different Americans. I interviewed all their family members. Some make it through the war. Some don't.

You read the book, you realize who makes it, who doesn't. But their lives converge around this area of the Netherlands. And when post-world War II stories end, with the war being over, remember us kicks into a transcendent moment when the Dutch come up with this idea of this great adoption program. The Americans refuse to provide the names and addresses of the next of kin.

So they're foiled with trying to achieve their ultimate objective. Which is to try to contact all the American families.

And frustrated, there was -- one of the key figures of the book.

A woman who is the mother of 12 children.

Who takes it upon herself. She's a woman of action.

She writes president Truman. And pleads for him to get involved.

When that doesn't work. She gets on the first airplane, she's ever flown on. She leaves her kids behind.

She flies to New York. Lands in LaGuardia Field.

She goes to Washington, and meets the members of Congress. Including a young guy from Texas, named Lyndon Johnson.

Who says, young lady, you need to go to Texas. Because there are so many military bases there.

She flies to our hometown. And lands in Lovefield.

In June of 1946. And is met by two family members. And for five weeks, she lives with American families, that lost somebody during a war.

And to each of them she says, leave your boys with us. When the election comes.

We will watch over them, like our own forever.

And they have done that. Now, today, these 10,000 Dutch doctors only have contact information for 20 percent of the American families.

They couldn't ever get the others.

GLENN: You're kidding me. Where is the list? Do you have a list?

ROBERT: Yeah. The Monuments Men and Women Foundation entered into a joint venture with the Dutch Foundation for Adopting Graves.

Not charging anybody for this. And we have created a website called foreverpromise.org.

And on that website is a list of all 10,000 men and women, more women that are buried at the cemetery, or whose names are on the walls missing.

And it's a searchable database. We're asking people to go and see. Do you have someone you know, or a relative, who is buried there.

And if so, we have a short questionnaire. What's your relationship? Are you aware of this great adoption program? Are you in contact with your adopter? Would you like to be? Would you allow us to share your contact information?

I connected a lady from Richmond, Texas. Saturday night. To her -- to this young Tammy, that's the adopter of her brother.

She's 93 years old.

She was in tears. At the thought when she leaves this world, there will be someone there to watch over her brother.

And that's what we're all about is this connecting.

GLENN: Rob, I have to tell you.

You've really done something with your life. I mean, I know you don't need me to say it.
But what a great job you have. And what a great service you have done for so many years.

Thank you so much.

Please, look this up.

The forever promise project.

You can find it at foreverpromise.org. Foreverpromise.org. Robert Edsel is the author's name. The book is Remember Us. It's a perfect read for this week.