Marco Rubio is relying in part on his Christian faith in his quest to win the Republican nomination for president. The Florida senator recently hired a director of faith outreach, assembled a religious advisory committee, has been interviewed in Christianity Today, and used a faith-based television ad to appeal to prospective voters in Iowa.
In November, Rubio appointed Eric Teetsel, a millennial Wheaton College graduate, to lead his effort to aggressively reach out to religiously devout Americans, especially evangelicals and conservative Catholics. In January, Rubio formed a religious liberty advisory board that includes such prominent evangelicals as theologian Wayne Grudem, National Hispanic Leadership Conference president Samuel Rodriguez, and California megachurch pastor Rick Warren. In his Christianity Today interview, as well as in his 2012 memoir, Rubio talks candidly and cogently about his faith journey, his religious convictions, and the impact that his faith has on his political positions. “The purpose of our life,” Rubio declares in his Iowa ad, “is to cooperate with God’s plan.” Rubio adds that his faith influences “everything that I do,” and affirms the evangelical position that salvation depends on accepting “the free gift … offered to us in Christ.”
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