John McCain: My Faith Sustained Me

Introduction

 
Faith and Action continues its series of in depth looks at the religious faiths of each of the presidential candidates. We now turn the spotlight on Senator John McCain. Previously, we examined Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, Rudy Giuliani, and John Edwards. Each of these candidates discusses their faith in order to appeal to voters. McCain is acutely aware of the importance of the evangelical vote after his failed attempt to win the Republican nomination in 2000.

This article is not intended to explore McCain’s economic, social, or foreign policies, except where they explicitly intersect with his personal religious faith. We did look at his legislative record, but only in light of what it tells us about his religious beliefs.

Early Life

John Sydney McCain III was born on August 29, 1936. He was the first of three children born to Roberta and John McCain Jr. Both his father and grandfather achieved the rank of four star admiral in the Navy. From his earliest youth, McCain knew he was destined to follow in their footsteps.

McCain was raised in his family’s Episcopalian faith. His great-grandfather was a minister in that denomination. McCain attended Episcopal High School in Alexandria, Virginia. He recalls that “students attended chapel every morning. On Sundays, we held morning services at the church on Seminary Hill and evening services at the chapel.”[i]

At home, McCain said his family “observed our faith openly and without reservation.”[ii] Of his father, McCain writes:

[He] was devout, although the demands of his profession sometimes made regular churchgoing difficult. His mother, Katherine, was the daughter of an Episcopalian minister, and she had ably seen to her son’s religious instruction, no small feat in a home where the head of the household happily indulged in a variety of vices. My father didn’t talk about God or the importance of religious devotion. He didn’t proselytize. But he always kept with him a tattered, dog-eared prayer book, from which he would pray for an hour, on his knees, twice a day.[iii] 

Asked how he compares to his father, McCain admits, “I’m not as devout or as good.”[iv]

After graduating from the Naval Academy in 1958, McCain became a naval aviator. He married Carol Shepp, a divorced mother of two sons. He adopted her children and they also had a daughter together.

Prisoner of War

In 1967, John McCain was shot down as he was flying a mission over Vietnam. He sustained serious injuries in the crash. After being attacked by a mob of Vietnamese citizens, he was taken to a prisoner of war camp. The Vietnamese offered him early release because of his father’s high rank in the Navy, but he refused. He remained imprisoned for five and a half years during which time he was often tortured.

McCain has often spoken publicly about the crucial role his faith played in helping him survive those terrible years. “It was my very faith in a Supreme Being that sustained me and strengthened me while at the hands of my captors.”[v]

Even on the very worst days, he was encouraged by his sense of God’s presence with him:

Once I was thrown into another cell after a long and difficult interrogation. I discovered scratched into one of the cell’s walls the creed “I believe in God, the Father Almighty.” There, standing witness to God's presence in a remote, concealed place, recalled to my faith by a stronger, better man, I felt God's love and care more vividly than I would have felt it had I been safe among a pious congregation in the most magnificent cathedral.[vi]

McCain has also recounted a moving story of one guard who was kind to the prisoners and secretly tried to alleviate their suffering. One Christmas morning, the guard walked up to him and drew a cross in the dirt. “We stood wordlessly there for a minute or two, venerating the cross,” he says.[vii] The guard then rubbed out the cross and walked off.

McCain had an unpleasant experience when he tried to explain the meaning of Easter to a curious Vietnamese interpreter. He told him that “Christ died. Then He came alive again. People saw Him and then He went back to heaven.” The interpreter went off for awhile but then came back and said, “You tell nothing but lies. Go back to your room.”[viii]

McCain and his fellow prisoners tried to formally practice their Christian faith as much as circumstances would allow. They once rioted over their guards’ refusal to allow them to hold church services in the manner they wished. McCain also recounts how one year the prisoners’ spirits were bolstered by a beautiful Christmas service. He read out the nativity story after copying it down from a Bible to which the Vietnamese had briefly given him access.[ix]

Beginning a New Life

In 1973, McCain and his fellow prisoners were released. He returned to the United States determined to reclaim his old life. After rigorous physical therapy, he was able to resume his work as a naval aviator. Eventually, however, he was forced to acknowledge that he would not be able to match his father and grandfather’s high rank in the Navy. He retired in 1981 and set his sights on politics.

McCain’s marriage to Carol, however, began to founder. He has admitted to carrying on affairs during this period. He was still married when he met Cindy Hensley, the heiress to a beer distributing business fortune. Three months after his divorce was finalized, McCain and Cindy were married.

The divorce took a toll on his family life. McCain is now on good terms with the children of his first marriage. His son Andy, however, admits that it took him four years to overcome his anger. This was aggravated by the fact that his mother’s health had been severely damaged as the result of a car crash during his father’s imprisonment. “I was certainly disappointed and mad at Dad.”[x]

John and Cindy McCain settled in her home state of Arizona. They have four children. Their younger daughter Bridget was adopted from one of Mother Theresa’s orphanages in Bangladesh. Cindy visited the orphanage as part of a charity relief mission. She had planned to take Bridget back to the United States for medical care, but soon realized she could not part with her.

After retiring from the Navy, McCain initially worked in public relations for his father-in-law’s beer distributing company. Then, in 1982, Arizona Rep. John Rhodes announced his retirement. McCain and his wife purchased a house in Rhodes’ congressional district that same day. McCain won the seat and served two terms in the House of Representatives before being elected to the Senate.

In 2000, McCain unsuccessfully challenged George W. Bush for the Republican Presidential nomination. Earlier this year he announced that he would be seeking the nomination again in 2008.

North Phoenix Baptist church

John McCain still identifies himself as an Episcopalian, but he and his wife have been attending North Phoenix Baptist for many years now. The church is part of the Southern Baptist Convention and has over six thousand members. Founded in Georgia in 1845, the Southern Baptist Convention is now the largest protestant denomination in America. It is an evangelical denomination known for its conservative theology.

McCain began attending North Phoenix Baptist because “I just liked the church.”[xi] He prefers it to the Episcopalian churches of his youth. He says he found “the message and fundamental nature more fulfilling than I did in the Episcopal church...They're great believers in redemption, and so am I.”[xii]

In an interview in 2000, however, McCain admitted that, “I don't go [to church] as much as I would like.”[xiii] Yet he appears to be very involved in North Phoenix Baptist’s church life. In 1998 he appeared with North Phoenix Baptist’s Pastor Dan Yeary in a video on prayer for internal church use. McCain has donated his speaking fees to the church in the past.

Cindy and two of the McCain children have been baptized at North Phoenix Baptist. McCain has not because “I didn't find it necessary to do so for my spiritual needs.”[xiv]

McCain has made a favorable impression on North Phoenix Baptist’s staff and members. Yeary says that the Senator “does not seek attention. If I tried to recognize him, he might chastise me.”[xv]

Arizona congressman J.D. Hayworth, a former North Phoenix Baptist member who has prayed with McCain, admires his honesty. “You read the Psalms, you see how David is brutally honest with God. That's John. He doesn't keep anything from the Creator any more than from the rest of us.”[xvi]

Dick Stafford, North Phoenix Baptist’s Associate pastor, says McCain has an authentic faith:

We encourage all our members to engage their world with their faith. That means they define the world they live, work and have a sphere of influence in, and try to live out an authentic faith in that environment...I think John's got an authentic faith. He has the same questions we all do about trying to find out what's right and living in accordance.[xvii]

Richard Jackson, pastor emeritus of North Phoenix Baptist, agrees that McCain has a strong personal faith, even though his knowledge of scripture is limited.

I'm concerned about a person's relationship with Christ, and I was convinced he had that personal faith. [McCain] is not a biblically versed, mature Christian. He's a novice scripturally. But the Hanoi Hilton is not a seminary.[xviii]

This was evidenced in 2000 when McCain inaccurately identified John 3:16. A supporter in South Carolina was wearing a shirt with the verse. McCain said it referred to the end of the world.[xix] The text of John 3:16 reads, “For God so loved the world that he gave His only begotten son that whosoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have everlasting life.”


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