萨拉·麦卡蒙是NPR的国家记者，多年来一直以福音派教徒的身份报道宗教运动。
她最近因保守的政治和政策退出了该运动。
麦卡蒙讲述了她的生活细节，包括在一个严格的中西部福音派家庭和社区中长大，并在她的新书《前福音派教徒:爱、生活和离开白人福音派教堂》中解释了她最终如何和为什么离开这一信仰。
她与ABC新闻直播的林赛·戴维斯谈论了这本书和她的经历。
ABC新闻直播:在我们深入讨论之前，对于外行人来说，主流新教徒和福音新教徒之间有什么区别?
莎拉·麦卡蒙:我认为简而言之，主流新教以一种可以说是福音派没有的方式拥抱了现代性。这意味着像现代科学方法一样的东西，包括接受进化论，而许多保守的福音派并不接受进化论。
ABC新闻直播:你成年后的大部分时间都是福音派教徒，并将质疑信仰描述为一种瓦解。什么对你不再有意义?
麦卡蒙:真的，那是我童年的大部分时光。我在书中谈到了许多看起来不太靠谱的事情。其中之一是我的家庭与我祖父的关系，我祖父是我们认识的为数不多的不信教的人之一，他在晚年公开自己是同性恋。
我们花了很多时间担心他。我们和他有很大的距离，部分原因是他的性取向。
在我的童年中，有些事情总是让我觉得不对劲。另外，你知道，在我的基督教学校被教授神创论时，我总是有点想知道为什么我们对世界历史的看法似乎与大多数其他人不同，以及为什么我们拒绝主流科学。
ABC新闻直播:你是2016年被指派报道川普竞选的NPR首席政治记者。由于你的福音派背景，你认为什么使你成为这份工作的合适人选?
麦卡蒙:我还记得20世纪90年代，当时许多福音派领袖大声批评前总统比尔·克林顿的道德缺失。我情不自禁地想起在我自己家里和我的社区中关于总统性格重要性的一些对话。
所以我在报道这次竞选的时候就在想这个问题。虽然我自己与那场运动无关，但我着迷于观察这些选民对特朗普的反应，他们会如何谈论他以及他们最终会做什么。当然，我们一次又一次地看到白人福音派运动支持特朗普。
ABC新闻直播:前总统唐纳德·特朗普似乎不是福音派可以支持的那种候选人，但他们过去和现在都是这样做的。
我记得有一次有人问他，你最喜欢《圣经》中的哪一章?他就像，哦，整件事。然后他说，两个科林蒂安，而不是像第二个科林蒂安。
有几个例子表明他不一定是一个真正的宗教人士。那么，你认为为什么福音派如此急切地支持特朗普，甚至不只是说，哦，我们通常支持共和党是因为保守信仰，但这是专门为了支持特朗普?
麦卡蒙:嗯，根据我的报道，我从与选民的交谈中感觉到，他们感觉到并且很长一段时间以来都感觉到这个国家在走下坡路。
我在书中引用了我在基督教学校读过的一些教科书，这些教科书谈到美国是一个基督教国家，是上帝特别以某种方式召唤和设计的。
通常，这是一种非常传统的家庭观。
许多年来，许多白人福音派教徒对这个国家的历史有一种热情洋溢的看法，他们认为这个国家出现的任何问题都是脱离基督教的结果。这是我成长过程中经常听到的一个主题。
因此我认为，当特朗普谈到让美国再次伟大时，他明确承诺为基督徒挺身而出，他说了很多次，包括最近，这引起了很多人的共鸣。
我认为他们根本不在乎他的性格。我的意思是，我们会听到这样的话，‘我们想要一个政治家，他是一个政治家，而不是牧师。’特朗普正在寻找一个可以动员的基地。福音派是一个很容易动员起来的群体，他们在为自己的思想寻找拥护者。
他答应做他们想做的事情。在很多情况下，他确实做到了。
Politics reporter discusses personal journey leaving evangelicalism
Sarah McCammon, a national correspondent for NPR, lived as an evangelical and covered the religious movement for years.
She recently left the movement over its conservative politics and policies.
McCammon recounts details of her life, including being raised within a strict Midwest evangelical family and community, and explains how and why she ultimately left the faith in her new book "The Exvangelicals: Loving, Living and Leaving the White Evangelical Church."
She spoke with ABC News Live's Linsey Davis about the book and her experiences.
ABC NEWS LIVE: Before we get too far in here, for the uninitiated, what's the difference between a mainstream Protestant and an evangelical Protestant?
SARAH MCCAMMON: I think the short version is that that mainline Protestantism has embraced modernity in a way that arguably evangelicalism has not. And that it means things like a modern approach to science, including the acceptance of evolutionary theory, which many conservative evangelicals don't embrace.
ABC NEWS LIVE: You were evangelical for most of your adult life, and described questioning the faith as a kind of unraveling. What stops making sense for you?
MCCAMMON: Really, it was most of my childhood. I talk in the book about many things that sort of seemed off. And one of them was my family's relationship with my grandfather, who was one of the few people we knew who was not religious and who came out as gay late in life.
We spent a lot of time worrying about him. We had a lot of distance from him, in part because of his sexuality.
There was something about that that always sort of felt wrong to me throughout my childhood. Also, you know, being taught creationism in my Christian school, I always kind of wondered why we seem to believe something differently about the history of the world than most other people did, and why we rejected mainstream science.
ABC NEWS LIVE: You were NPR's lead political reporter assigned to cover the Trump campaign in 2016. Because of your evangelical background, what would you say made you the right person for the job?
MCCAMMON: I'm old enough to remember the 1990s, when many evangelical leaders were loudly criticizing former President [Bill] Clinton for his moral failings. And I couldn't help but remember some of those conversations in my own home and in my community about the importance of character in a president.
So I was thinking about that as I was covering this campaign. And while I had my own separation from that movement, I was fascinated to see how those voters would react to Trump, how they would talk about him and what they ultimately would do. And, of course, we've seen again and again that the white evangelical movement has embraced Trump.
ABC NEWS LIVE: Former President [Donald] Trump didn't appear to be the type of candidate evangelicals could get behind, yet they did and still do.
I remember that time when he was asked what's your favorite, you know, chapter in the Bible or Scripture? And he was just like, oh, the whole thing. And then he said, Two Corinthians, rather than like Second Corinthians.
There were several examples of him not necessarily being really a religious person. So why do you think that the evangelicals were so eager to support Trump in particular, not even just say, oh, we normally back Republicans because of the conservative beliefs, but this was specific to support Trump?
NPR correspondent Sarah McCammon discusses her book "The Exvangelicals" with ABC News' Linsey...Show more
ABC News
MCCAMMON: Well, based on my reporting, I, my sense from talking to voters was that they felt and had felt for a long time that the country was on the decline.
I cite in my book some of the textbooks I read in Christian school that talked about America as a Christian nation that was specifically sort of called and designed by God to be a certain way.
And usually, that was a pretty traditional, traditional view of families.
And there was this very kind of glowing view that was presented to a lot of white evangelicals for many years about the history of the country and a sense that anything that was going wrong in the country was a result of falling away from that, falling away from Christianity. This was a theme I heard a lot growing up.
And so I think when Trump talked about making America great again, and he explicitly promised to stand up for Christians, he said that many times, including recently, that resonated with a lot of people.
And I think they didn't fundamentally care that much about his character. I mean, we would hear things like, 'we want a politician, he's a politician, not a pastor.' And Trump was in search of a base that he could mobilize. And evangelicals were an easily mobilized base who were in search of a champion for their ideas.
He promised to do the things that they wanted. And he did, in many cases.
