Promise Keepers
Promise Keepers logo.
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| Founded | 1990 |
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| Founder | Bill McCartney |
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Area served
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International |
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Key people
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Doctor Raleigh Washington, President |
| Website | promisekeepers |
Promise Keepers is an Evangelical Christian organization for men. While it originated in the United States, independent branches are established in Canada and New Zealand. It is self-described as "a Christ-centered organization dedicated to introducing men to Jesus Christ as their Savior and Lord, helping them to grow as Christians". Promise Keepers is a non-profit organization, not affiliated with any Christian church or denomination, which champions opposite-sex marriage and marital fidelity. Their most widely publicized events tend to be mass held at football stadiums and similar venues. They also sell a variety of promotional products to "help men keep their promises," including clothing, books, and music. Bruce Wilkinson developed the widely used video curriculum, Personal Holiness in Times of Temptation, as a part of "The Biblical Manhood" series for Promise Keepers. Their organizational model has been mimicked by other religious movements, like the Catholic men's movement.
Promise Keepers was founded in 1990 by Bill McCartney, then the head football coach at the University of Colorado Boulder. According to the group's website, McCartney got the inspiration for Promise Keepers on March 20, 1990, during a conversation with Dave Wardell, while both were attending a Fellowship of Christian Athletes banquet in Pueblo, Colorado. He envisioned his home stadium, Boulder's Folsom Field, would be used as a gathering "for training and teaching on what it means to be godly men". In July 1990, 72 men met at Boulder Valley Christian Church in Boulder to organize what would be Promise Keepers' first event at University of Colorado's Event Center. From that point, the Promise Keepers' membership gradually grew. By the time of the first official PK conference in July 1991, approximately 4200 attended. The organization was incorporated as a nonprofit in the state of Colorado in December 1990.
What Makes a Man?, Promise Keepers' first hardbound book written for the organization, was published by The Navigators' Navpress publishing arm in 1992 for its first Folsom Field gathering in June of that year. James Dobson had McCartney on his Focus on the Family nationwide radio program that same month. McCartney resigned his coaching position in 1994 in order to focus his attention on the organization.
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