Ginny Dent Brant to hold book signings in Moncks Corner, Summerville | Culture | Berkeley Independent

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Ginny Dent Brant to hold book signings in Moncks Corner, Summerville

Published Tuesday, November 09, 2010 10:22 AM

By Jim Tatum
Berkeley Independent

Lowcountry readers interested in the life and times of an influential South Carolina political strategist turned worldwide evangelist will have a chance to learn more this weekend.

Upstate author Ginny Dent Brant, eldest daughter of the late Harry S. Dent Sr., will be in Moncks Corner and Summerville Saturday to sign copies of her new book, “Finding True Freedom: From the White House to the World,” a memoir about her father and his remarkable life’s journey.

Originally from St. Matthews, Dent entered politics to save the world and protect the freedoms of his country, Brant says. Dent began his career working for Senator Strom Thurmond and would go on to serve three presidents and become a chief architect of the Republican Party’s Southern Strategy. At the height of his political career, he would be a trusted, high ranking strategist for President Richard M. Nixon – and would be one of the few in that administration to escape the Watergate scandal.

After the Watergate years, especially, Dent would come to a number of life-altering epiphanies, Brant noted. For example, during the earlier years, he was a classic workaholic – always on the road, never home, all the while believing he was doing the right things for his family. Later, he would realize that this nearly cost him his family.

“He had regrets about that and apologized to us for it,” she said.

Brant said she actually came to God before her father did, which made for some interesting changes in both life direction and dynamics between father and daughter. In fact, Brant had undertaken a promising and successful career as a runway model when her faith led her to walk away from the catwalk and follow her faith instead. Despite her father’s objections, she enrolled in Columbia International Bible College in Columbia. Today she is a very busy author, teacher, lay minister, and head of Laity Alive and Serving, the ministry Dent founded in 1985.

“He said if I did that, I’d never be successful,” she noted. “I know he loved me and only wanted what was best for me. It was a hard decision, but it was what I know God wanted me to do.”

And yet, a few years later, Harry Dent would accept Jesus Christ as his savior. In 1982, Dent left his legal and political career to enter full time ministry.

“If you don’t think God has a sense of humor, think about this: Daddy didn’t want me to be a missionary, and yet the last 33 years of his life he became the very thing he initially tried to forbid me to do,” she said with a chuckle.

In fact, after the fall of communism, Dent’s ministry took him to Romania where he assisted the underground churches and a country emerge to new found freedom following 40 years of communism.

“He would not only help them build, he would help find them ministers for the congregations,” she said. “He did anything and everything he could.”

After her father's death to Alzheimer's, Ginny realizes everything her father fought for in his political life is now going in the opposite direction. The book ends in a dialogue about earthly and spiritual freedoms and challenges the reader to find spiritual freedom by surrendering to God's divine purpose and to stand for earthly freedom in this country before it is too late.

Ginny Dent Brant will be at Books on Main, Main Street, Moncks Corner from 10 a.m. 12 p.m. Saturday and at Community Christian Store, 118-A E. Richardson Avenue, Summerville from 2 – 4 p.m. Saturday. For more information go to www.ginnybrant.com.

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