DENVER — James Dobson is stepping down as chairman of Focus on the Family, the conservative religious group announced Friday -- a change that comes as the political movement Dobson has long embodied has been torn by questions over its direction and priorities.
Dobson, 72, will continue to broadcast his popular radio show, write books and newsletters, speak out on family issues and retain a prominent role at the Colorado Springs-based group that he founded in 1977.
"He'll continue to be a voice to be reckoned with," spokesman Gary Schneeberger said. "He'll still be very front and center."
Dobson will be replaced by retired Air Force Lt. Gen. Patrick P. Caruana, who has been on the organization's board since 1996. Jim Daly, who replaced Dobson as Focus' chief executive six years ago, said the organization would "forever be committed to the fulfillment of the mission so definitively served by both Dr. and Mrs. Dobson: helping families thrive."
The move comes as U.S. evangelicals are reconsidering their movement's tie to the Republican Party and to wedge issues like same-sex marriage that Dobson has long emphasized.
"It's very symbolic, the handing off of evangelical leadership to the next generation, whoever that may be," said the Rev. Joel Hunter, senior pastor of Northland church in Orlando, Fla.
Dobson initially opposed Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) for president but grudgingly backed the eventual nominee against Democrat Barack Obama, whom Dobson sharply criticized.
Other evangelical leaders, such as Hunter, who offered the benediction at the 2008 Democratic National Convention, have been less confrontational with Obama and are shifting their focus to issues like global warming and combating poverty.
"I think, if anything, it's less enticing for him to be continuing to do this because the Republicans are out of power and because of the identity crisis" in the movement, said Bill Leonard, dean of the School of Divinity at Wake Forest University in North Carolina. "His voice is less central, certainly, to the religious political issues and a new generation of evangelicals.
"There really has been a shift and in some ways, a fragmenting of American evangelism," Leonard said. "A new generation of evangelists is blogging their way around the old power structures and challenging many dogmatic ideas that people like Dobson set forth."
