ADVERTISEMENT
Faithfully Magazine
  • News
    • All
    • Crime
    • Politics
    • World
    David Wenwei Chou

    FBI Probes Attack on Taiwanese American Churchgoers in California as Hate Crime

    Ruth Whitfield

    God-Loving Matriarch and Devoted Church Deacon Among Buffalo Shooting Victims

    Crystal Mason provisional ballot

    Texas Court Must Reconsider Illegal Voting Conviction of Black Woman Sentenced to 5 Years

    Kelly Neidert UNT

    ‘The Most Hated Conservative College Student in the State’: How a Texas Student Embroiled Her Campus in a Culture War

  • Clippings
    Dr. John Cheng, 52, was fatally shot by David Chou

    Dr. John Cheng Hailed as Hero for Stopping Laguna Woods Church Gunman

    The May 13, 2022, funeral procession of Palestinian-American journalist Shireen Abu Aqleh in Jerusalem

    Israeli Police Attack Christian Journalist’s Funeral Procession, Beat Mourners

    cellphone

    Nigerian Student Beaten to Death, Set on Fire for Critical WhatsApp Post of Prophet Muhammad

    Indian Boarding School Students

    Christians Likely Helped Run Half of U.S. Indian Boarding Schools

  • Features
    children in a classroom getting education

    On Race and Schools, Here’s What Americans Agree and Disagree On

    Kelly Neidert UNT

    ‘The Most Hated Conservative College Student in the State’: How a Texas Student Embroiled Her Campus in a Culture War

    Stop Asian Hate sign

    ‘We Are Being Hunted’ — Asian Americans Say They Are More Scared Now Than Ever

    Ida B. Wells Doll Barbie

    Ida B. Wells Barbie Doll Faces an Uphill Battle Against Anti-Blackness

  • Inspiration
    • All
    • Bible
    • First-Person Essay
    • Poetry
    Everything Everywhere All At Once. (A24 Films)

    ‘Everything Everywhere All At Once’ & the Absurdity of Love as Resistance

    God Speaks Through Wombs: Poems on God's Unexpected Coming

    The Gospels Give Birth to Poetry (‘God Speaks Through Wombs’ Excerpt)

    two women talk

    100 Proverbs That Teach Us How to Speak, Listen, and Respectfully Disagree

    Rapper J Cole and a hanging tree

    J. Cole’s ‘Javari,’ the Cross, and the Lynching Tree

  • Members
  • About Us
    • Staff and Advisors
    • Write for Us
    • Advertise With Us
SUBSCRIBE
No Result
View All Result
  • News
    • All
    • Crime
    • Politics
    • World
    David Wenwei Chou

    FBI Probes Attack on Taiwanese American Churchgoers in California as Hate Crime

    Ruth Whitfield

    God-Loving Matriarch and Devoted Church Deacon Among Buffalo Shooting Victims

    Crystal Mason provisional ballot

    Texas Court Must Reconsider Illegal Voting Conviction of Black Woman Sentenced to 5 Years

    Kelly Neidert UNT

    ‘The Most Hated Conservative College Student in the State’: How a Texas Student Embroiled Her Campus in a Culture War

  • Clippings
    Dr. John Cheng, 52, was fatally shot by David Chou

    Dr. John Cheng Hailed as Hero for Stopping Laguna Woods Church Gunman

    The May 13, 2022, funeral procession of Palestinian-American journalist Shireen Abu Aqleh in Jerusalem

    Israeli Police Attack Christian Journalist’s Funeral Procession, Beat Mourners

    cellphone

    Nigerian Student Beaten to Death, Set on Fire for Critical WhatsApp Post of Prophet Muhammad

    Indian Boarding School Students

    Christians Likely Helped Run Half of U.S. Indian Boarding Schools

  • Features
    children in a classroom getting education

    On Race and Schools, Here’s What Americans Agree and Disagree On

    Kelly Neidert UNT

    ‘The Most Hated Conservative College Student in the State’: How a Texas Student Embroiled Her Campus in a Culture War

    Stop Asian Hate sign

    ‘We Are Being Hunted’ — Asian Americans Say They Are More Scared Now Than Ever

    Ida B. Wells Doll Barbie

    Ida B. Wells Barbie Doll Faces an Uphill Battle Against Anti-Blackness

  • Inspiration
    • All
    • Bible
    • First-Person Essay
    • Poetry
    Everything Everywhere All At Once. (A24 Films)

    ‘Everything Everywhere All At Once’ & the Absurdity of Love as Resistance

    God Speaks Through Wombs: Poems on God's Unexpected Coming

    The Gospels Give Birth to Poetry (‘God Speaks Through Wombs’ Excerpt)

    two women talk

    100 Proverbs That Teach Us How to Speak, Listen, and Respectfully Disagree

    Rapper J Cole and a hanging tree

    J. Cole’s ‘Javari,’ the Cross, and the Lynching Tree

  • Members
  • About Us
    • Staff and Advisors
    • Write for Us
    • Advertise With Us
No Result
View All Result
Faithfully Magazine
No Result
View All Result

Evangelical Nonprofit NRB Fires Spokesman for Encouraging Christians to Get Vaccinated

FM Editors by FM Editors
August 28, 2021
in Coronavirus, Health, News, Spotlight, Wellness
Reading Time: 4 mins read
0
NRB's Daniel Darling appears on the MSNBC show Morning Joe

Daniel Darling appears on the MSNBC show “Morning Joe” on August 2, 2021. (Photo: video screengrab)

Share on FacebookShare on TwitterShare on RedditShare on LinkedInEmail This
160
SHARES
ShareTweetPin It

By Bob Smietana

(RNS) — The spokesman for a major evangelical nonprofit was fired for promoting vaccines on the MSNBC “Morning Joe” cable news show, Religion News Service has learned.

Mosaic Coffee

Daniel Darling, senior vice president of communications for the National Religious Broadcasters, was fired Friday (Aug. 27) after refusing to admit his pro-vaccine statements were mistaken, according to a source authorized to speak for Darling.

RELATED STORIES

Colonial Prejudices, Vaccine Nationalism Drive COVID-19 African Travel Bans

What Majorie Taylor Greene and the Nation of Islam Have in Common

His firing comes at a time when Americans face a new surge of COVID-19 infections due to the highly contagious Delta variant even as protesters and politicians resist mask mandates or other preventive measures.

During a broadcast on Aug. 2, Darling, an evangelical pastor and author, told host Joe Scarborough about how his faith motivated him to get a COVID-19 vaccine. Darling described the vaccines as an amazing feat of discovery by scientists, some of whom share his Christian faith.

Darling said he was proud to be vaccinated.

“I believe in this vaccine because I don’t want to see anyone else die of COVID. Our family has lost too many close friends and relatives to COVID, including an uncle, a beloved church member and our piano teacher,” Darling told Scarborough.

He expressed similar views in a recent USA Today opinion piece.

Earlier this week, leaders at NRB, an international association of Christian communicators with 1,100 member organizations, told Darling his statements violated the organization’s policy of remaining neutral about COVID-19 vaccines. According to the source, Darling was given two options — sign a statement admitting he had been insubordinate or be fired.

When he refused to sign a statement, Darling was fired and given no severance, the source told RNS.

Troy Miller, CEO of NRB, confirmed Darling was no longer with the organization. He did not respond to a question about the role Darling’s statements about vaccines played in his departure.

“Dan is an excellent communicator and a great friend. I wish him God’s best in all his future endeavors,” Miller told RNS in an email.

Hulu

In a statement reported by Ruth Graham of the New York Times, Darling said that he was “sad and disappointed that my time at NRB has come to a close.”

“I am grieved that the issues that divide our country are dividing Christians,” he said in the statement, adding that he intended to devote himself to “unifying believers around the truth of the Gospel.”

Statement from @dandarling on his firing today. pic.twitter.com/3ADhEE4EtG

— Ruth Graham (@publicroad) August 27, 2021

While on “Morning Joe,” Darling said his Christian faith played a key role in his decision to be vaccinated — saying the Bible’s command to love our neighbors informed that decision. The vaccine, he said, helps protect our neighbors from the spread of COVID-19.

Darling also expressed sympathy for those who are hesitant to be vaccinated, seeing it as part of a larger breakdown of trust in American culture.

“When trust goes down,” he said on the show, “belief in conspiracies goes up.”

White evangelical Christians and Hispanic Protestants are among the faith groups most likely to be hesitant or refuse to get the COVID-19 vaccines, according to a recent survey from the Public Religion Research Institute. That study found vaccine hesitancy dropped among many faith groups from March 2021 to June 2021.

Still, 1 in 4 white evangelicals said they refuse to get a vaccine, while an additional 1 in 5 was hesitant, according to PRRI.

Darling criticized those who try to shame people who are vaccine-hesitant or who rejoice when someone who was unvaccinated becomes ill with COVID. Neither of those approaches is helpful, he said on the show.

He also encouraged his fellow evangelicals to consider following his example.

“I do encourage folks to talk to their doctor and really consider it, just because we just don’t want to see anyone else unnecessarily die of this lethal virus,” he said.

Founded in 1944, the NRB “works to protect the free speech rights of our members by advocating those rights in governmental, corporate, and media sectors, and works to foster excellence, integrity, and accountability in our membership by providing networking, educational, ministry, and relational opportunities,” according to its website.

The organization recently emerged from a period of fiscal distress, after operating with a series of significant budget deficits from 2012 to 2018, according to financial disclosures filed with the Internal Revenue Service. In the fiscal year 2018, the NRB had nearly $300,000 more in liabilities than assets. In 2019 and 2020, the organization had more revenue than expenses.

News of Darling’s firing was met with anger and disappointment on social media.

“Words fail,” tweeted author and attorney David French of the Dispatch. “Dan was abruptly fired by a large Evangelical ministry for going on television and sharing why he got vaccinated in the midst of a deadly pandemic.”

“This is insanity,” tweeted ethicist and theologian Russell Moore, Darling’s former boss at the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics and Religious Liberty Convention.

Darling, an ordained minister and author of a number of books, including “A Way with Words” and “The Dignity Revolution,” joined the NRB in April of 2020, following six years at the ERLC.

Darling still believes in the mission of the NRB and his statements about vaccines, his authorized source told RNS.

In his August USA Today editorial, Darling said vaccines save lives and encouraged his fellow Christians to consider being vaccinated before more lives are lost.

“There are not many things in the world today that are worthy of our trust, but I sincerely believe the COVID-19 vaccine is one of them,” he wrote. “As a Christian and an American, I was proud to get it.”

A previous version of the story reported that a source said Darling was asked to recant his statements. After publication, the source told RNS that Darling refused to sign a document saying his pro-vaccine statements were insubordinate. The story has been updated with a statement from Darling. 

Leave your vote

0 Points
Upvote Downvote

Browse and manage your votes from your Member Profile Page

What's Your Reaction?

  • AngryAngry
    0
    Angry
  • CuteCute
    0
    Cute
  • CryCry
    0
    Cry
  • LOLLOL
    0
    LOL
  • LoveLove
    0
    Love
  • OMGOMG
    0
    OMG

REPRINT REQUESTS | MEMBERSHIPS | GIVE



Share This Post

Share via

Share This Post

  • Digg
  • Tumblr
  • Flipboard
  • SMS
More
  • Report
160
SHARES
ShareTweetPin It

Related Posts

Tops Friendly Markets in Buffalo, New York

Overtly White Supremacist Ideology Is Being Sanitized and Mainstreamed

Dr. John Cheng, 52, was fatally shot by David Chou

Dr. John Cheng Hailed as Hero for Stopping Laguna Woods Church Gunman

Upcoming Live Events

There are no upcoming Events at this time.

Recently Published

  • Overtly White Supremacist Ideology Is Being Sanitized and Mainstreamed
  • Dr. John Cheng Hailed as Hero for Stopping Laguna Woods Church Gunman
  • FBI Probes Attack on Taiwanese American Churchgoers in California as Hate Crime
  • God-Loving Matriarch and Devoted Church Deacon Among Buffalo Shooting Victims
  • Israeli Police Attack Christian Journalist’s Funeral Procession, Beat Mourners
Mosaic Coffee
  • Privacy Policy
  • Contact Us
  • Shop
  • Newsletter

© 2022 Faithfully Media LLC, owner and operator. All rights reserved. This site participates in the Amazon Associates program, and other affiliate programs, and may earn a commission from your purchases.

No Result
View All Result
  • News
  • Clippings
  • Features
  • Spotlight
  • Inspiration
  • Log In
    • Your Profile
Share via

Share This Post

  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • Reddit
  • Email
  • WhatsApp
  • Copy Link
  • Tumblr
  • Digg
  • Flipboard
  • SMS
close

Log In

Sign In

Login with Facebook
Login with Twitter
Forgot password?

Don't have an account? Register

Forgot password?

Enter your account data and we will send you a link to reset your password.

Back to Login

Your password reset link appears to be invalid or expired.

Log in

Privacy Policy

Accept

Add to Collection

  • Public collection title

  • Private collection title

No Collections

Here you'll find all collections you've created before.

This website uses cookies. By continuing to use this website you are giving consent to cookies being used. Visit our Privacy and Cookie Policy.
Send this to a friend