What I Believe

I am a Christian. That is the most important thing about me — more important than any degree, any title, any office I may ever hold. Everything else I do flows from that identity: my service in uniform, my work as an attorney, my commitment to this community, and my understanding of what it means to lead.

God

God eternally exists in three persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Each is fully God in himself, and yet God is one. I find the perspective of Eastern Orthodoxy — that God's threeness is the assumed reality to which his oneness must be reconciled — more helpful than the reversed Western view. God is omniscient, omnipotent, and sovereign. But his sovereignty is not the cold determinism of a distant watchmaker. God practices a general sovereignty, desiring genuine relationship with free agents and thereby giving them a real freedom to love or reject him. The Triune God is relationship by nature, and that is reflected in the kind of sovereignty he has chosen to exercise.

Christ and Salvation

Jesus Christ is the incarnation of Yahweh — fully God and fully man. He was born of a virgin and partook of all the experiences of humanity, becoming like us in every way except in sin. As a man, he recapitulated the purpose of mankind, fulfilling God's original intention for humanity. Through his life, death, and resurrection, Christ set us free from the bondage of sin, death, and the devil. He ascended into heaven to sit at the right hand of God, where he intercedes on our behalf as our high priest. He will come again to judge creation, claim his final victory, and establish his eternal kingdom.

Salvation requires a real and personal commitment to Jesus Christ and an acceptance of his grace. This commitment does not have to occur at a single point in time, but it must be genuine. Salvation cannot be inherited — yet children of believers stand at an advantage, born as children of the freed rather than under the full bondage of sin. Salvation is not something to be possessed like a wallet that can be lost. It is relational — a life-giving dependence on the Father that cannot be reduced to legal formulas about justification. Salvation is a process that begins at baptism, unfolds through sanctification, and reaches completion at the eschaton. As Athanasius wrote, "The Son of God became man, that we might become God" — not that we become God in essence, but that God works to transform us into the divine image, incorporating us into his work and conforming our character to his own.

God and man cooperate in this process, for man is powerless to accomplish it alone and God will not force his will upon anyone. Those who claim salvation while refusing to cooperate in the divine plan — pointing to a perverse understanding of soteriology and calling it grace — have no place in the kingdom of God. There is no such thing as "fire insurance" purchased by reciting a prayer. Salvation lies only close to God. We are to work out our salvation with fear and trembling.

Scripture

The Bible is without error in all matters of faith and practice. On everything Scripture addresses, it is infallible and unable to deceive. But Scripture is a book of theological truths, written to guide God's people in the life of faith — it is not a science or history textbook. God inspired Scripture, granting it infallibility in matters of theological truth. Human authors did the actual writing and brought with them their own cultural presuppositions. God did not find it necessary to precede revelation with corrections of contemporary scientific misunderstandings, and so Scripture could theoretically contain incidental historical or scientific imprecisions that do not threaten its infallibility in what it teaches. Scripture must be understood for what it says, and its authority rests in its canonical form as defined by the Church.

The Church

I am a Catholic — and an unapologetic one. I came to the Catholic Church not away from evangelicalism but through it. I grew up Southern Baptist, was educated at a Baptist university, and was shaped by the evangelical commitment to Scripture, personal conversion, and sharing the Gospel. I have never left those convictions behind. I consider myself an evangelical Catholic — someone who holds the fullness of the Catholic faith while cherishing the evangelical passion for the Word of God, the necessity of a personal relationship with Christ, and the urgency of the Great Commission.

The Church is the body of Christ and carries his authority. Christ vested that authority with the apostles — particularly Peter — and it continues through their successors in the episcopate and through the office of the papacy. The Church is not infallible per se, but it is constantly moving toward infallibility on issues of faith and practice. Through the guidance of the Holy Spirit, the Church was able to discern which books were canonical, the meaning of baptism, the reality of the Eucharist, and other theological truths. These things are not true because the Church declared them so — the Church declared them so because they are true.

I believe the things that unite Christians across traditions are far greater than the things that divide us. Catholics and evangelicals share a commitment to the authority of Scripture, the deity of Christ, salvation by grace through faith, the sanctity of human life, the importance of the family, and the call to serve the poor and the vulnerable.

Faith and Reason

I believe faith and reason are allies, not enemies. God created the human mind and gave us the capacity to know him — through creation, through conscience, and supremely through his revealed Word. Serious faith does not require intellectual surrender. It requires intellectual courage: the willingness to ask hard questions, to sit with uncertainty, and to pursue truth wherever it leads.

Doubt, honestly engaged, produces humility — and humility is the beginning of wisdom. The Christian who has never wrestled with doubt has never taken the questions seriously enough. I would rather stand before God as someone who struggled honestly with faith than as someone who never thought deeply enough to struggle at all.

Faith and Public Life

I do not believe faith is a private matter. The same Bible that calls us to love God with all our heart, soul, and mind also calls us to love our neighbor as ourselves — and that command has public consequences. Caring for the vulnerable, defending the rule of law, protecting religious liberty, building strong families and communities — these are not merely political positions. They are moral obligations rooted in the character of God.

My faith is why I served in uniform. It is why I became an attorney. It is why I believe that public service — at every level — is a calling, not a career. The rule of law, individual liberty, and biblical principles are not competing values. They are the foundation of a free society.

People of faith have a responsibility to show up in the public square with both conviction and charity — to speak plainly about what we believe, to listen to those who disagree, and to lead with the kind of servant-hearted integrity that reflects the One we follow.