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My Old Church’s Fundamentalist Wing Canceled Me
A few months ago, the Opinion columnist David French and his family were canceled by their former church. In response, French wrote about the painful experience of being abandoned by his faith community. The column led to an outpouring from readers …
A few months ago, the Opinion columnist David French and his family were canceled by their former church. In response, French wrote about the painful experience of being abandoned by his faith community. The column led to an outpouring from readers sharing their own thoughts and similar experiences. In this audio essay, French sits down with his editor, Aaron Retica, to discuss the fallout and listen to some of the responses he received from readers.
Below is a lightly edited transcript of the audio piece. To listen to the piece, click the play button below.
My Old Church’s Fundamentalist Wing Canceled Me
David French responds to reader reactions following his split from his church.
Aaron Retica: I’m Aaron Retica. I am an editor in the Opinion section of The Times. And I work with a number of our columnists and contributing writers, mostly on American politics.
We’re thinking constantly in Opinion about the divisions in the country. And one of our columnists and someone I work closely with who has really explored this deeply is David French.
He is in a unique position because he was once a fierce partisan, as he says himself, a Romney delegate in 2012, but for the apostasy of not wanting Donald Trump to be president, he was cast out of a number of Republican institutions. But it was not only Republican institutions he was cast out of but also his church, in the end.




