Jim Daly (evangelist)

Early life, influence, education and career

Daly grew up in Southern California. He was abandoned by his alcoholic father at age 5, and orphaned by his mother’s death from cancer when he was 9. He was then placed in a foster home until he moved in with his older brothers and then with his father, who eventually turned back to alcohol and died. By the time that Daly was a senior in high school, he was living on his own.

Daly experienced a Christian conversion at 15 while attending a camp run by the Fellowship of Christian Athletes. He went on to study at California State University, San Bernardino, and eventually earned his Master of Business Administration from Regis University.

Daly worked in the paper industry until he was recruited to join Focus on the Family, at one-third of his six-figure private sector pay.

He has served at Focus for 16 years in a variety of positions including as assistant to the president for Public Affairs, Vice President of the International Division, and a Group Vice President under former U.S. Secretary of Energy and Secretary of the Interior, Donald P. Hodel (then Focus President), before ascending to the presidency.

Focus on the Family

Daly shares Dobson’s views in the public policy arena, but has taken a different approach than his predecessor. Daly refers to himself more of an evangelist than a prophet. He believes that the Christian community should demonstrate the values it wishes to promote and maintain civil discourse.

While Dobson's approach was highly political and partisan, Daly and his colleagues have said that he is trying to make it less so.

Similar to Dobson, Daly and his colleagues oppose abortion and same-sex marriage, but also wishes to address issues other than these typical evangelical hot button issues; they "want to frame political work as an inspirational call to do good—not just to oppose what they view as sinful behavior."

Daly says that he wishes to make abortion much rarer as a step toward eliminating it.

In addition to abortion rights groups at the state and local levels, Daly has also met with organizational leaders who are traditionally at odds with conservative evangelicals, including the Colorado-based gay rights organization, the Gill Foundation. Daly participated in the White House’s Fatherhood initiative. With the Colorado Springs Independent the two organizations co-sponsored an event supporting foster families.

Daly’s childhood experience prompted him to start Wait No More, an organizations that encourages Christians to adopt children. Wait No More led to a drop in the number of children in foster care in Colorado from 900 to 365. Daly wants Colorado to become the first state to "wipe out the waiting list for foster care."

Daly reaches out to the younger generation through various speaking engagements at venues such as Kings College in NYC, "The Civil Conversations Project" from On Being with Krista Tippet, featuring conversation between Daly and Q Ideas leader, Gabe Lyons, and writing for Catalyst, a ministry that develops Christian leaders.

Host of the daily radio broadcast

Daly hosts a radio broadcast with John Fuller that reaches an estimated 220 million listeners worldwide. He has interviewed Christian leaders and notable guests including Drew Brees, Pam and Bob Tebow, Dave Ramsey, Chuck Colson, Dr. Kevin Lehman, Jerry Jenkins, Mark Burnett, Roma Downey and former US President George W. Bush.

Radio and media attention

Daly has appeared on such television programs such as Fox and Friends, Larry King Live, America Live with Megyn Kelly, and ABC World News Tonight. In 2010 he was named one of the nation’s top new evangelical leaders by Newsweek.

Awards