Who is Douglas W. Phillips?
A collection of his writings & sayings
Part 1: The Vision Forum Era
2001
On Biblical Patriarchy:
“Every age has its defining crisis. Sin is always at the heart of the crisis. But the manifestation of sin expresses itself differently from age to age. The defining crisis of our age is the systematic annihilation of the Biblical family. The family was the first institution created by God and blessed by Christ during His earthly ministry. It is God’s primary vehicle for communicating covenant promises to the next generation. It is the basic agency of dominion on earth. Within the context of the family, the father is the God-ordained vision communicator.
“Minimize the father and the family will perish. Minimize the family and you have neutralized the church. The sad truth is that broken and weak families are the norm even within the most conservative and doctrinally orthodox church assemblies. This is in large part due to the death of Biblical patriarchy with its emphasis on father-directed vision, leadership, and self-sacrifice.”
– Douglas Phillips
Source
2002
On Ectopic Pregnancies:
“…Those theories which justify the killing of the unborn child on the basis of the circumstances of conception (as in the case of rape and incest), or even the life of the mother (ectopic pregnancies) are completely false because they are based on unbiblical and humanistic ethics, unbiblical definitions of ‘self defense’ theory, and a rejection of the personhood of the child; and Continuing Relevance of All of Scripture”
– Douglas Phillips
Source
On “Why the Life of the Mother is Not a Valid Exception for Abortion”:
“To conclude, mothers should never kill their babies. There are no exceptions. The Bible condemns abortion and offers no exceptions to this rule. Abortion is not even biblically permissible in so-called ‘life of the mother’ cases. As with all ethical decisions, our approach to the question of ‘abortion for the life of the mother’ must be dictated by Scripture alone. We are not to look to situation ethics, the advice of the medical community, personal opinion, or even ‘common sense’ to help us make life-and-death decisions concerning our unborn children. Nor may a Christian look to their emotions, to human traditions, to majority consensus, to their personal experience, or to a private revelation from God as the basis for their decision-making. ”
– Douglas Phillips
Source
On Hospitality:
“Do you open up your home, and when people come in and they say, ‘Thank you, thank you,’ do you immediately defer to your husband and say, ‘Oh, this is the generosity of my husband. He’s the lord of the home. He’s opened it up to you. I’m doing this to serve my husband, and representing my husband, I welcome you into this home.’”
– Douglas Phillips
The Wise Woman’s Guide
Source
On “Disrespectful” women:
“And then there’s Vashti. Her disrespect, her presumption, her dishonor brought shame on her husband. But more than that, the people of her society understood that if her disrespect to her husband was left unchecked, it would create national rebellion of women against their husbands all across the entire civilization. … If a woman is allowed, unchecked, to be wroth and disrespectful to her husband, it sends a message to women everywhere that they can do the same.”
– Douglas Phillips
The Wise Woman’s Guide
Source
On Women Having Home Businesses:
“We have women that say, “I want to have my own cosmetics business. I want to have my own this business. And I’ll bring income into the family.” Sounds really good, but there’s a dangerous, perilous direction we can take there if it becomes my business, my ministry. You see, a woman isn’t about her business. She’s about completing and fulfilling her husband’s mission and ministry and the two of them are yoked together as one as co-laborers in a joint dominion mission for the glory of God with the division of labor and with a hierarchy of priorities and responsibilities. This is the way the Scripture teaches.”
– Douglas Phillips
The Wise Woman’s Guide
Source
On John Brown:
“During my talk on controversies in American history, I reminded the Kansans that their community had once been ravaged by one of the most evil men in American history, John Brown, a terrorist who shot children on account of their parentage.”
– Douglas Phillips
Source
On Spanking Toddlers:
“About a month ago, Beall spanked [2 year old daughter] (she gets the most of any child I have ever seen) for some atrocity to which she responded: ‘I’m going to go upstairs and tell God that you spanked me! Beall told her that it was actually God that had told her that she had to spank little [daughter]. She responded that then, she’d ‘go tell Jesus.’
“Of course this little bit of disrespect merited another spanking and a dose of a theological discussion about who tells what to whom, and the glories of the Trinity, but that did not stop us from howling about it later in the night.”
– Douglas Phillips
Source
On “Chief Justice: Persecuted For the Cause of Christ” Roy Moore:
“The Bible teaches that the godly in Christ will suffer persecution. One of the most notable examples in our lifetime of an elected official being persecuted for Christ sake is Chief Justice Roy Moore of the Alabama Supreme Court. the facts are not complicated: The Chief Justice believes that he must honor his oath of office to the Constitution which explicitly delcares(sic) that the acknowledgement of the Christian God is the foundation for the Alabama legal system. Consistant(sic) with that oath and with the mandate of the people of Alabama who elected the Chief Justice in a virtual landslide, he exercised his office of Chief Administrator of the Supreme Court building by placing a monument
“For this he has been persecuted and wrongly attacked.”
– Douglas Phillips
Source
2004
On Daughters:
“This weekend, girls, if you haven’t given your heart to your dad, this is the weekend that needs to happen. And if your heart has strayed, if you’ve forgotten your dad, if you’ve broken the commitment of your heart, this is the time, now is the time to recommit: ‘I thank God for my father. My daddy, though he may be a sinner, is nonetheless my love and my hero and God has given him to me and he is my gift and I will follow him and I will serve him and I am grateful from the bottom of my heart for my daddy.’ That must be our daughters’ cries.”
– Douglas Phillips
in “Sleeping Beauty and the Five Questions”
Source
Screenshot from the Vision Forum 2007 Catalog
“You’re not gonna learn how to be a godly wife unless you learn how to serve your father first, because God has put your daddy in your life as a model, as a picture of the man that someday your heart will be entrusted to.”
– Douglas Phillips
in “Sleeping Beauty and the Five Questions”
Source
On Courtship:
“Daughters aren’t to be independent. They’re not to act outside the scope of their father. As long as they’re under the authority of their fathers, fathers have the ability to nullify or not the oaths and the vows. Daughters can’t just go out independently and say, ‘I’m going to marry whoever I want.’ No. The father has the ability to say, ‘No, I’m sorry, that has to be approved by me.’”
– Douglas Phillips
Source
On Adult Daughters:
“Both sons and daughters are under the command of their fathers as long as they are under his roof or otherwise the recipients of his provision and protection. Fathers release sons from their jurisdiction to undertake a vocation, prepare a home, and take a wife. Until she is given in marriage, a daughter continues under her father’s authority and protection. Even after leaving their father’s house, children should honor their parents by seeking their counsel and blessing throughout their lives. (Gen. 28:1-2; Num. 30:3ff.; Deut. 22:21; Gal. 4:1,2; Eph. 6:2-3)”
– Douglas Phillips
The Tenets of Biblical Patriarchy
Source
On Manliness:
“The Bible presents a doctrine of manliness. Historically, manliness played a central role in the cultural theology of Western Christendom. The twentieth century, with its emphasis on feminism, a co-ed military, and mothers leaving the home for the workforce, wreaked havoc on the doctrine of manliness.”
– from the Vision Forum 2007 Catalog
Source
On Male Leadership:
“Male leadership in the home carries over into the church: only men are permitted to hold the ruling office in the church. A God-honoring society will likewise prefer male leadership in civil and other spheres as an application of and support for God’s order in the formative institutions of family and church.(1 Tim. 3:5)”
– Douglas Phillips
The Tenets of Biblical Patriarchy
Source
On Fathers & Daughters:
“God’s Word speaks volumes to the relationship between fathers and daughters: His most sacred duty is her protection and preservation from childhood to virtuous womanhood. He leads her, woos her, and wins her with a tenderness and affection unique to the bonds of father and daughter….
“Is it any wonder that Satan is on the prowl seeking to tear the hearts of daughters from their fathers… young ladies who have replaced the love of their fathers with the acceptance of peers and inappropriate romantic relationships?”
– Description from the Vision Forum Ministries Father Daughter Retreat
Source
2012
On Feminism:
“Hatred for God-appointed distinctions between men and women has been a central theme of media and education for close to a half a century now. From time to time there is a backlash against the feminist lobotomy of our once Christian culture, but rarely is a nuanced, thoughtful, biblical perspective presented. Offering such a perspective is part of the mission of this generation of Christians as we aspire to rescue the doctrine of the family, both in terms of its orthodoxy and orthopraxy, from the morass of egalitarianism. One thing is clear, decades of feminism has not helped women figure out their role in the family and society”
– Douglas Phillips
In a post on “Doug’s Blog”
Source
On the Presidential Endorsement of Same-Sex Marriage:
“For two decades the frog has been in the pot while the temperature has been slowly turned up. It began with the Bush’s toleration for homosexuality, was advanced in full by Clinton and has reached its logical zenith under Obama. So we should not be surprised by the official announcement that the President of the United States of America has finally declared to the world his opposition to the historical, common law and biblical meaning of marriage. President Obama may be remembered for many things, but few are as fundamental in its treason to his countrymen, to his oath of office and to the living God then his decision to use the presidency to redefine a definition of marriage that was established on Day Six of Creation and has been the benchmark of civilization for 7,000 years. Mark your calendars–May 9, 2012, the President of the United States of America finally crossed a line from which there is no return without repudiation and repentance. Terrorists are dangerous. The economy is a real and present danger. But there is simply nothing other then the holocaust of the unborn which imperils the safety of our country or places our people in jeopardy as does the leader of the Western World publicly raising his fist at the Heavens and declaring that the bedrock institution of society, ordained of God and meant to be protected by the state, is little more than a convention of convenience for the children of Sodom to transform the meaning of something which is precious to Jesus Christ and a living picture of His love for the Church, into a legally protected justification for perversion, and vehicle of hatred aimed directly at that love.”
Doug Phillips, President Vision Forum Ministries
Source
2013
On Contraception:
“The Church embraced the basic tenets of Margaret Sanger’s vision for the eugenic age which said that some people [sic] life is not worth living; that men can lawfully manipulate their reproduction; and that some babies shouldn’t be brought into this world.”
– Douglas Phillips
As Quoted in an email sent out by Vision Forum
Part 2: Resignation & Lawsuit
2013 & 2014
What Doug said:
“There has been serious sin in my life for which God has graciously brought me to repentance. I have confessed my sin to my wife and family, my local church, and the board of Vision Forum Ministries. I engaged in a lengthy, inappropriate relationship with a woman.”
-Doug Phillips
Source
What the lawsuit said:
“Douglas Phillips held a high position of trust in [his family’s nanny’s] life, personal family circles, social circles, and her religious circle. Phillips carefully, intentionally, and effectively closed off all access to outside intervention and support necessary for her to challenge him.
“As described herein, Douglas Phillips used [nanny]—against her wishes and over her objections—as a personal sex object. Douglas Phillips repeatedly groped, rubbed, and touched [nanny]’s crotch, breasts, and other areas of her body; rubbed his penis on her; masturbated on her; forced her to watch him masturbate on her; and ejaculated upon her. This perverse and offensive conduct repeatedly took place over the course of several years.”
-Excerpt from a lawsuit filed against Doug Phillips following his departure from Vision Forum
Source
Part 3: After Vision Forum
Note: Douglas W. Phillips has used a variety of pseudonyms, social media handles, & business names used since the closing of Vision Forum. These include but are not limited to “DW Cinematographer”, “Doug WP”, “Phil Douglas”, “DW Winters”, and “Cinema of Wonder”. The Vision Forum Facebook page also remains active.
Screenshot of a video credited to DW Cinematographer
Source
Source
Screenshot of a video posted by “Phil Douglas”
Source
Source
On Interacting with Trafficking Survivors:
“And now it has ended. I came to do a job, and it was completed. A documentary report on human trafficking – Both the exploitation and the rescue of girls and boys….
“Holding the hand for two hours of an 11 year old girl as shook uncontrollably reliving the experience of being raped by a family member; Embracing fatherless boys and being told that some had never had a man hug them before… Being asked by three different 11 year old girls if they could call me ‘Appa’- father….
“I find myself teetering between extremes: I want to be quiet, but I need to talk. Not about monsters who lock little girls up or sell them on the market, but about the power of kindness… The power of the human touch to heal.”
– Douglas Phillips
Source
2020
On the George Floyd protests:
“Why So Many Police Are Quitting Their Jobs
Probably because they are asking the following question: Who wants a job where they are falsely accused, manipulated by political interests to advance questionable agendas, betrayed by their friends, abandoned by leaders, where you can not possibly succeed in your work, and are subject to nonstop mob harassment and hatred?”
– from the Vision Forum Facebook page*
Source
On empathizing with the NYC police during the George Floyd protests (again):
“But you realize that your sympathies are irrelevant because justice and injustice have been so conflated to mean the same thing, that you can be fairly confident that, by morning, you will be tried and executed on social media. Your community leaders are so frightened that they will not defend you.
“And with just moments to go before you try to rescue families and businesses from possible permanent economic ruin at the hands of the curfew-breaking mobs, you realize that you do not even have the support of your mayor, your governor, or key politicians in the country, some of whom are calling for the forced retirement of every police officer in America.
“You feel alone in the universe, charged with the duty of protecting your city tonight.”
– from the Vision Forum Facebook page*
Source
2021
On the #MeToo Movement:
“From numerous outspoken #metoo activists who have been exposed for false accusations and their own abusive and criminal behaviour, to media and political leaders who built careers attacking others only to be exposed themselves – it is becoming increasingly apparent that those who build a guillotine for others, will eventually find their own head on the block. ”
– From the Vision Forum Facebook page*
Source
“…There was also the possibility that we could reach more kids because at that time I owned a catalog company that produced three catalogs, two uniquely for children. ”
– Douglas W. Phillips
In a story about how Vision Forum acquired the Children’s creationist radio Drama “Jonathan Park”
Source
“Douglas W. Phillips is a filmmaker, attorney, author and writer/producer of The Mysterious Islands. He is the former Adjunct Professor of Apologetics for the Institute for Creation Research. ”
– Douglas W. Phillips
(A bio on his blog)
Source
On comparing Hamas, #MeToo, COVID, and Black Lives Matter:
“…The providence of God is more powerful than the self-righteous authoritarianism of those screaming for blood. This is true for the MeToo execution squads. The Black Lives Matter riots. The COVID enforcement mania. The pro-Hamas, anti-semitism violence. The disinformation and terrorism campaigns of Vladimir Putin.
Mobs have their day. But in the end, they consume themselves.”
– From the Vision Forum Facebook page*
Source
*It is possible that Doug is not the only author on the current Vision Forum Facebook page