Since I grew up Southern Baptist, I have heard many, many people give “testimonies” about how they embraced faith and were “born again.” Now that I am Eastern Orthodox, I have heard many people tell similar stories about how they came to embrace ancient Christian doctrines and beauty of sacramental worship.

Most of the time these stories include some details about history of the person’s faith or lack thereof. One part of telling the point to which a believer has travelled is to share some background information about where the journey started.

I would certainly think that this would be true when the person who is “testifying” is America’s current First Lady. Thus, I had a few expectations when I started reading the Associated Press report that ran with this headline: “Jill Biden says SC ‘prayer partner’ helped change her life.”

The hook for this story was the surprise visit that President Joe Biden and First Lady Jill Biden made to West Columbia, S.C., to honor the 50th anniversary of the Rev. Charles B. Jackson becoming the pastor of Brookland Baptist Church. The focus of the story, however, was on Jill Biden’s “prayer partner” relationship with the pastor’s wife, Robin. Here is the crucial passage in this AP report:

The first lady doesn’t usually speak publicly about her faith but said Sunday that “it’s always been an important part of who I am.” She recalled being a teenager who “fell in love with the peace of the quiet wooden pew,” the “joy of the choir” and the “deep wisdom of the Gospels.” 

She said prayer helps her “connect to the people that I love and to the world around me.” 

“But in 2015, my faith was shaken,” the first lady said, her voice breaking as she described watching “my brave, strong, funny, bright young son fight brain cancer.” 

“Still, I never gave up hope,” she said. “Despite what the doctor said, I believed that my son would make it. In the final days, I made one last, desperate prayer and it went unanswered.”

She didn’t understand how Beau could die. She grew angry, then distant from God.

I felt betrayed by my faith, broken,” the first lady said, her voice quivering. Her own pastor emailed occasionally to check in and invite her back to service “but I just couldn’t go. I couldn’t even pray. I wondered if I would ever feel joy again.”

I kept waiting to learn more about Jill Biden’s faith — especially since the article made it clear that she had, well, a faith to lose and her own church’s pastor was in contact to try to help her.

OK, I will ask: What church was that? Would it help to include a paragraph, maybe even two, about the First Lady’s faith before this turning point meeting with Robin Jackson and the prayers that followed it?

I would say yes.

As it turns out, the team at the Washington Post “lifestyle” did ask a few questions of that kind, in a story that ran with this dramatic double-decker headline:

Jill Biden paid a surprise visit to the woman who helped her regain faith in God 

Biden told a surprised South Carolina congregation that she lost faith after the death of her son, Beau, and it was years before she prayed again.

The post story include all the basic details, while weaving in more details about Black Baptist worship — from long tributes, a spectacular choir, lots of traditional hymns and pews lined with women in spectacular Sunday church hats.

But this was the passage that I found interesting. After the death of Beau Biden, Joe Biden had years of Catholic worship and ties to Catholic clergy to help him wrestle with the loss. He dug into the stacks of letters from friends and citizens offering prayers and support.

Then the Post story added, in a passage that is long, but essential:

Jill Biden handled her grief differently. She says … that she stopped going to church with Joe and their grandchildren. The letters addressed to her sat in a bag in her closet, unopened.

“I’m not very public about my faith,” Biden told the church congregants. “But it’s always been an important part of who I am. I chose it as a teenager when I fell in love with the peace of the quiet wooden pew, the joy of the choir like this magnificent choir here, and the deep wisdom of the Gospels. Prayers especially are a way that I connect to people that I love and to the world around me.”

Her parents were “self-proclaimed ‘agnostic realists’” who never took Biden or her sisters to church, she writes in her memoir, but she went with both of her grandmothers, one a Baptist and one a Presbyterian. She liked the feel of the tiny Presbyterian church more and in her sophomore year of high school found a nearby Presbyterian church and started taking membership classes, becoming an official member at age 16. Her two younger sisters did the same when they became teenagers.

Things changed for her when Beau got sick. “For over a year I watched my brave, strong, funny, bright young son fight brain cancer,” Biden told the church, her voice trembling with emotion, words getting lost as she choked back tears. She never gave up hope that he would live, she said, despite the terrible odds the doctors gave for his survival. “In the final days,” she said, “I made one last prayer, and it went unanswered.”

Her minister would write her occasional emails, checking in, inviting her back to the service. “But I just couldn’t go,” she said. “I couldn’t even pray. I wondered if I would ever feel joy again.”

That’s a starting point for this story. The contact with Robin Jackson, apparently, led to prayers and some form of restoration for Jill Biden’s faith.

Is there a separate story there that is worth pursuing?

Living in the White House complicates everything, and I get that. But how has the practice of her faith changed on a day to day basis?

FIRST IMAGE: Screen shot from the News 19 WLTX coverage of Jill Biden’s talk at Brookland Baptist Church in West Columbia, S.C.