James Dobson praised Miss California USA Carrie Prejean for preaching a sermon with her life. Miles McPherson, her pastor, compared her to Esther. Prejean claimed God chose her and trusted her to speak out. Even now that she has been stripped of her title, Prejean is on the talk show circuit talking about her beliefs. "When God is for you, no one can be against you," she told Larry King.
I’ve been studying religion and beauty pageants for my Ph.D. dissertation, and even I’m still trying to wrap my head around the last two months of headlines. Nobody expected Prejean’s comments about gay marriage to be news, nor for American evangelical communities to promote Prejean as a pageant preacher.
The irony of the controversy is not how unique Prejean is for using the pageant to promote her Christian beliefs, but how in line with pageant tradition she is.