White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders is being shamed by The New Yorker for attending a popular Christian megachurch in Washington, D.C.
The left-leaning outlet rebuked Sanders for going to the church, which is affiliated with Hillsong. The New Yorker’s Paige Williams described the congregation as being part of a “global megachurch that teaches creationism and intelligent design.”
“Sanders, when asked if she shared these views, said, ‘I believe in the Bible,’” Williams wrote. “She told me that her pro-life views are ‘non-negotiable,’ and added, ‘One of the things that makes Americans unique is that we value life. We think each life has intrinsic value and worth, whether you are a baby in the womb or an elderly woman.’”
Sarah Huckabee Sanders attends a D.C. church that is an affiliate of Hillsong, the global megachurch that teaches creationism and intelligent design. Sanders, asked if she shared these views, said, “I believe in the Bible.” https://t.co/ASibdWueke pic.twitter.com/hCV2icGEFD
— The New Yorker (@NewYorker) September 18, 2018
The comment seems benign enough — good, even — and is well within the mainstream of Christian ideals and values, but Williams wrote her piece as if the Trump administration’s spokeswoman is somehow espousing radical, fringe religious beliefs.
Williams went on to note Sanders “opposes gay marriage, but isn’t a virulent homophobe like her father [former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee] — he defends conversion therapy and says that gay relationships have an ‘ick factor,’” she wrote.
Christians, particularly those with a conservative political perspective, have long argued much of America’s elite society displays hostility toward evangelical beliefs.
In 2017, Russell Moore, president of the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission, pointed to the scrutiny President Donald Trump’s conservative federal judge appointees have faced, particularly over their religious convictions.
“There’s more explicit hostility toward Christians in some sectors of power — that is real and not imagined,” Moore told Christianity Today. “There’s always a tendency to have a siege mentality and to imagine that people hate us, when they’re just not thinking about us at all. But I do think there are several examples where that’s the case.”
The New Yorker’s story about Sanders comes the same week it was revealed NPR refused to run an advertisement for an upcoming pro-life film about abortionist Kermit Gosnell. The ad was nixed for accurately describing Gosnell, who is now serving life in prison over several counts of first-degree murder and for performing illegal late-term abortions, as an “abortion doctor.”