Unpacking Purity & Power in Church with Kristin Kobes Du Mez

Host Andrew Camp interviews historian and author Kristin Du Mez about her background in the Christian Reformed Church, her scholarly approach to evangelicalism as a cultural historian, and a pivotal moment watching Donald Trump’s 2016 speech at Dordt University that prompted her to reassess white evangelical values. Du Mez argues support for Trump is not a “betrayal” but reflects deeper values embedded in evangelical subculture, shaped through Christian media, bookstores, and products, especially those marketed to white Christian women. Discussing her forthcoming book Live, Laugh, Love, she connects evangelical women’s culture, multi-level marketing dynamics, and New Thought/positive-thinking theology to prosperity logic, purity culture, and “biblical womanhood,” highlighting Elisabeth Elliot’s complex story. She links domesticity and purity to authoritarian politics and Christian nationalism, notes post–Cold War shifting threats sustaining high-control religion, and closes with cautious hope grounded in truth-telling, faithfulness over winning, and history’s unpredictability.Kristin Kobes Du Mez is a New York Times bestselling author and Professor of History at Calvin University. She is a Senior Democracy Fellow with the Public Religion Research Institute. Her research focuses on the intersection of gender, religion, and politics. Her most recent books include Jesus and John Wayne: How White Evangelicals Corrupted a Faith and Fractured a Nation (2020) and Live Laugh Love: The Secret History of White Christian Women and the World They Made (September 2026). She is a Distinguished Associate at the Institute for Christian Studies (Toronto) and recently served as a Fellow at the University of Notre Dame’s Center for Philosophy of Religion (2024-2025).Preorder Live, Laugh, Love (release date: September 15, 2026)Follow Kristin Kobes Du MezFacebook: kkdumezInstagram: @kkdumezSubstack: Du Mez CONNECTIONSFollow Andrew CampFacebook: andrew.camp.9Instagram: @andrewcamp80Substack: @thebiggesttableThis episode of the Biggest Table is brought to you in part by Wild Goose Coffee. Since 2008, Wild Goose has sought to build better communities through coffee. For our listeners, Wild Goose is offering a special promotion of 20% off a one time order using the code TABLE at checkout. To learn more and to order coffee, please visit wildgoosecoffee.com.  (00:00) - Kristin Du Mez Origins (03:46) - Trump and Evangelical Values (17:37) - Live Laugh Love and New Thought (28:41) - Women’s Christian Media World (30:54) - Elizabeth Elliot’s Complicated Legacy (38:33) - Purity Politics and Hope