In the months since Charlie Kirk’s assassination, endless conversations and conspiracies have swirled around the late conservative activist.
One of the main claims about Kirk, an evangelical Christian, centers on his alleged move towards Catholicism with several influencers, including Candace Owens, who claim he is abandoning his Protestant tenets.
More recently, John Yep of Catholics for Catholics suggested that Kirk had revealed in an interview that he was inching toward converting to Catholicism.
But that’s not what Pastor Lucas Miles, TPUSA senior director of faith, is saying.
In Miles’ own words, he “served directly under Charlie’s guidance for the last year and a half of my life,” but Kirk explained via X on Monday that he is not actually considering converting to Catholicism.
Miles writes:
Several recent interviews with John Yep have spread the claim that Charlie Kirk was in the process of converting to Catholicism. That claim is not accurate and needs to be revised.
As the Senior Director of Faith at TPUSA and someone who served directly under Charlie’s leadership during the last year and a half of his life, I am in a position to speak candidly about this.
I have been in personal contact with Charlie’s wife (Erica) and have also spoken directly with Father Klein, the priest mentioned in this discussion. After these conversations, the facts are clear.
• Charlie was not in the process of converting to Catholicism.
• He had never taken a Catholic Conversion Class (OCIA).
• His marriage was never recognized by the Catholic Church.
• He was baptized into the Presbyterian Church and remained a Bible-believing evangelical throughout his life.Father Klein expressed concern that previous statements have been misinterpreted and that current public discourse does not accurately represent his conversations with Charlie and Charlie’s intentions.
Let me be clear: respecting Catholicism is not the same as converting. Charlie respected many people across denominations. Like many evangelicals, including myself, he read widely, including Augustine and Aquinas. None of that constitutes a conversion trajectory.
In my own conversations with Charlie, he was adamant about justification by grace and did not believe that certain Catholic doctrines such as Mariology and Invocation of the Saints could be reconciled with the Bible. On the few occasions he attended Mass, he found it peaceful and beautiful. Charlie was not asked for a selfie and enjoyed sitting in the empty sanctuary and worshiping peacefully. It’s a long way from getting into OCIA.
If there was an active conversion process, the document should exist. Nothing.
Charlie loved all true Christians, whether Catholic, Orthodox, or Evangelical. Again, we’re a long way from getting into OCIA.
It’s strange that we even have to deal with this.
An occasional “bump of the fist” does not create a close friendship, nor does it give (Jong Yep) the authority to speak on behalf of the dead. I would caution him to be careful not to exaggerate things that the facts simply do not support. This is not about scoring theological points. It’s about accurately honoring Charlie’s real life and beliefs and refusing to let speculation rewrite his story.
Miles’ statement comes as conspiracy theorist Owens launches a podcast series questioning the authenticity of Kirk and Erica’s marriage, Erica’s political ideology and family structure.
The series also continues to support conspiracy theories about Israel and Jews, which she frequently references.
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