LAUREN FRAYER, HOST:

I'm filling in for Scott Detrow, who's been reporting from North Carolina, one of a handful of states that will determine this year's presidential election. Here's his latest report from Raleigh.

SCOTT DETROW, BYLINE: On a late October evening in North Carolina's capital city, a massive stage in a dark auditorium is backlit by tall screens, and bass-thumping music and vocals are filling the space.

UNIDENTIFIED MUSICAL ARTIST: (Singing) Rejoice. Rejoice.

DETROW: There's a table of judges in front of the stage. Think "American Idol" but with a clearly religious focus. It's worship team audition night at Cross Assembly Church inside the congregation's nearly 1,700-seat sanctuary on a sprawling, multi-wing campus that resembles a high school or community college.

Hey. Scott - nice to meet you.

CHAD HARVEY: Scott - good to meet you, man.

DETROW: This Pentecostal church is led by pastor Chad Harvey, whose sermons, often to weekly crowds of about 3,000, usually wind up on Cross Assembly's social media channels.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

HARVEY: If I thought the fate of history depended on the 2024 election, I'd be as anxious as you and popping as many pills as you are. Fortunately, I don't believe that stuff. My hope is in Jesus, not in the politics.

DETROW: But as Harvey ends up telling us, there is no way to completely avoid political discourse in the church.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

MARK ROBINSON: Every time I take this stage, I do not take it in my own name. I don't take it in the name of the lieutenant governor. I take it in the name of Jesus Christ.

DETROW: That is Republican Mark Robinson, North Carolina's lieutenant governor and now a gubernatorial candidate, speaking to Cross Assembly back in 2021 several years before he became the star of Democratic attack ads across the North Carolina airwaves for a string of controversial comments, stances and alleged actions. Evangelical and Pentecostal conservatives are a powerful force in Republican politics. They have fueled the rise of candidates like Robinson, and they've stuck by former President Donald Trump for going on three presidential elections in a row. That's despite Trump's long list of criminal charges, sexual harassment and assault allegations and regular brutal personal attacks on political opponents, all of which wouldn't fit many people's definition of a Christian.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

DONALD TRUMP: Kamala is mentally impaired. If a Republican did what she did...

DETROW: In fact, in the closing weeks of a tight race in North Carolina, Trump has been appealing directly to religious conservatives.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

TRUMP: Christians, get everyone you know and vote. You have to vote.

DETROW: Harvey and I talked about all of this - Trump, religion, politics in general - in a small side prayer room on cross assembly's campus.

How much does politics come up day-to-day conversation when you're talking to people here, when you're talking to people in the congregation, when you're doing your pastoral work?

HARVEY: You know, it's very interesting. I think an outsider looking into the evangelical Pentecostal movement would assume that politics plays a huge role in the life of the church. It actually doesn't. I'd say 1 to 2% of my conversations are about politics. I think a lot of people are just trying to make ends meet. They're trying to live their lives, but politics surprisingly does not play as big a role in the life of a faith community like this that a lot of people would. Now, I've told our folks this. You know, our church is accused of being a little bit too political, and I said, you know, the church is not getting more political. Politics is getting more spiritual. And so we're seeing this infiltration into the political realm of things that used to be the church's territory - family, human sexuality. Now politics is starting to tackle those spiritual issues.

DETROW: And in your perspective, is that a good thing or a bad thing?

HARVEY: You know, I think it's neutral.

DETROW: It's interesting to me. I'm wondering what you think about this. So many of the big issues in this race are those kind of spiritual world issues. It's, what does it mean to be a family? It's, what role should the government play in regulating abortion? It's what to do with people who are coming into this country as immigrants, obviously a big theme in the Bible. How do you think about the big issues that are out there and what the role is for the church to play in having conversations with people?

HARVEY: Yeah. So there are some issues that I feel the political world has now infringed, if you would, on my territory.

DETROW: Yeah.

HARVEY: Human sexuality, the sanctity of life. I think with our congregation, if you were to ask, what are the moral issues that are really driving your views of the political climate, it would be, No. 1, the sanctity of life. Religious liberty, I think, is becoming more and more of an issue as well. This whole transgender thing - and the transgender thing is an umbrella term that encompasses Title IX...

DETROW: Sure.

HARVEY: ...And athletics and all that. Should biological males be in women's athletics? That umbrella term is a huge issue.

DETROW: How do you think about which candidates you are going to support? Is it through the lens of the issues they support? Is it through how they come across as individuals?

HARVEY: Scott, I think - what I've told our congregation is we look at the platform, not the person. And so you can have some people with some pretty deep moral struggles who are upholding a platform that we support. And I tell our people, don't pay as much attention to the struggles. Pay attention to the platform because here's what the Bible says. There's none righteous - no, not one. We're all messed-up people. This core message that we have of the Gospel - it's the good news. The bad news of the good news is we're all messed-up people.

DETROW: Yeah.

HARVEY: So whether it be some of the accusations that have been lodged at Mark Robinson recently, whether it be Kamala Harris and Willie Brown and - did you work at McDonald's? Donald Trump telling Howard Stern the sexual revolution of the 1970s was my personal Vietnam - they're all messed-up people. And so that's the one thing we have to keep in mind as a congregation.

DETROW: Let me just ask a direct question about this with Trump because I think we have all, in this country, been thinking about this for a decade...

HARVEY: Yeah. Yeah.

DETROW: ...For good or bad.

HARVEY: Right.

DETROW: And I think there's a lot of people outside the evangelical or Pentecostal world, people who either are different religious affiliations or more secular people who kind of have - or they think, you know, Donald Trump has such a high support from so many Christians around the country and yet is somebody who lives in a gold tower with his name on it...

HARVEY: Right.

DETROW: ...Who...

HARVEY: Right.

DETROW: ...Crudely insults people and, among other things, you know, is facing criminal charges. And they just feel like, this is not the message, as I understand it, of Christianity, but there's such a strong support. I know you've gotten this question before.

HARVEY: Yeah.

DETROW: What's the best way you explain it to someone who says, I just don't understand that?

HARVEY: Yeah. Yeah. So I would say, again, I keep going back to the - we're all messed up people. Trump is messed up. Kamala Harris is messed up. Joe Biden has had accusations thrown at him. We're all messed-up individuals. And so I think what I keep coming back to is a lot of people seem to think that we're having a continuous, 24/7 Trump rally in the evangelical Pentecostal circle. We're actually not. We're well aware of his foibles. We're well aware of where he's messed up. I think the reason Trump is resonating with evangelicals is this mess aside that we all know about. The platform he's supporting, like it or not, is closer aligned to our view of scripture than the other side.

DETROW: Does that create a world, though, where there's never any accountability for anybody personally?

HARVEY: I do think that at some point, there will be a line that's crossed. And so at that point, what I said is, sure. That's fine. Man, let's just make sure we're using that standard across the board. So this candidate did this. I can't support him. That's fine. Don't support him. Only thing I'm asking is use that same standard.

DETROW: You mentioned the lieutenant governor. I want to ask about that because I think one of the first things that drew us was that he's spoken to to Cross Assembly in the past, and you've gotten to know him a little bit.

HARVEY: Yeah. Yeah.

DETROW: What do you make of him as a candidate and as a man?

HARVEY: You know, as a man, very winsome. I think one thing that drew him to a lot of individuals in our congregation is we have somebody in high political office who's talking our language. I've said many times about Mark Robinson, for every strength is a corresponding weakness. His strength is he's not part of the political system. The weakness is sometimes he talks like a man who's not part of the political system, and maybe he phrases things that make people uncomfortable. But as an individual, I really feel like the values that he espoused from the pulpit really resonated with our biblical world views.

DETROW: What I'm hearing is that line hasn't been crossed yet.

HARVEY: Yeah.

DETROW: I don't want to put words in your mouth. I just want to make sure...

HARVEY: Yeah, no, no. That's - I think what I would say is the Bible says God hates unequal scales. So if we're going to hold Robinson to this standard, that's fine. And, again, I'm not trying to be the National Enquirer, but, OK, was the Willie Brown relationship a leg up to ascend in the political realm?

DETROW: It's a critique that many conservatives have made, though there's no clear evidence it's true, that an early relationship with San Francisco's then-mayor while he was separated from his wife launched Vice President Kamala Harris' political career. As for Robinson...

HARVEY: OK. Yeah. He messed up.

DETROW: Yeah.

HARVEY: If that's your standard, I can't vote for Robinson because he messed up - not saying that he did. But if that's the standard, that's fine. But now I'm going to ask you to hold every other candidate that you potentially would support to that standard. I would not bring him probably on staff as my pastor or co-pastor here until we get these issues situated. So we're now talking about him as a political candidate, not as a spiritual leader...

DETROW: Yeah.

HARVEY: ...Because he did speak at our church, and I think some people see that and say, well, do you view him as a spiritual leader? Well, no, I don't. He's still political candidate.

DETROW: Harris and Democrats have been trying to reach out to religious voters as well, highlighting Trump's actions and statements.

(SOUNDBITE OF RADIO SHOW, "THE BREAKFAST CLUB")

VICE PRESIDENT KAMALA HARRIS: Where I was raised - and I know many of us were - understanding that our God is a loving God, that our faith propels us to act in a way that is about kindness and justice and mercy, that is about lifting one another up. And let's talk about the contrast here. Donald Trump and his followers spend full time trying to suggest that the measure of the strength of a leader is based on who you beat down.

DETROW: We asked Pastor Chad Harvey about that comment and its direct reference to scripture which Harris made in a recent interview on iHeartRadio's "The Breakfast Club."

HARVEY: Look. Micah 6:8 - what does the Lord require you to do? Do justly, to love mercy, walk humbly with your God. And he's not doing justly. He's not loving mercy, and he's not walking humbly with his God. So how can you support a man like this? And I think probably I would say we might be redefining justice and mercy. And by that, I would say Donald Trump, with some of his positions on life, is showing more justice and mercy to the unborn or the post-born than the left is.

DETROW: I think we've talked about this in pieces here and there, but I want to give you a chance just to directly talk about it in one swoop. What do you think more secular listeners, listeners of other religious persuasions, listeners who live in other part of the country - what do you think it is they misunderstand the most about congregations like yours?

HARVEY: Wow. That's a great question. I would say, again, kind of putting my ear to the ground and seeing what's being said about the evangelical Pentecostal voting bloc, I think one of the biggest misperceptions is that this is what is dominating our mind. This is what's really driving us. I keep hearing this term, Christian nationalism. That's been the big buzzword in 2024. I've not heard of that until this year that we're just trying to impose our Christian beliefs on this nation and make us a Christian nation. That may be true for other congregations. I don't know that that's true for a large segment of evangelical Pentecostal Christians.

You know, the Bible says, make it your goal to live a peaceful and quiet life. I think a lot of us just want to have a peaceful and quiet life, be able to share the good news of Jesus Christ. I don't think we're driven by this desire to make America a Christian nation, and I don't think politics really occupies as big a part of our brain as people think it does.

DETROW: Well, Pastor Chad Harvey, thank you, despite that, coming to talk politics with us.

HARVEY: Yeah. It was great. I enjoyed it. Thank you so much, Scott. Yes, sir.

FRAYER: That was one of several reports Scott filed from North Carolina as part of NPR's We, the Voters series. The reporting was produced by Tyler Bartlam and Kathryn Fink and edited by Ashley Brown. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.

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