Ben Sasse's Religious Beliefs Are Central to How He's Viewing the End of His Life

Although he's no longer in Washington, former senator Ben Sasse is still reflecting on both politics and faith in public. The former senator is now dying of cancer, and he's using his final months on Earth to offer an appeal for reason to his former colleagues. Sasse, a conservative Republican, definitely has a particular perspective on the world's problems.

Even so, now that pancreatic cancer has left him with just months to live, he is sharing that time with the public and also discussing how faith has informed his journey. Here's what we know about his faith.

Sasse is a devout believer in reformed Christianity or Calvinism, which has a number of specific tenets. Among them are a belief in the complete sovereignty of God, which means that he controls all things, a belief that God chose specific people for salvation, the Bible is the ultimate authority on matters of faith, and because of the fall of man, humanity is unable to choose God or save themselves from damnation.

Given his belief that God is in total control of everything, Sasse has had to reckon with what his cancer diagnosis means for his faith.

"Death is wicked. Death is evil. Death is not how it's supposed to be," he told CBS. "And me getting a cancer diagnosis, again, is pretty small on the grand scheme of things. But it's a touch of grace because it forces me to tell the truth. And the lie I wanna tell myself is that I'm the center of everything."

"And I'm gonna be around forever. And I can work harder, and store up enough, that I can atone for my own brokenness," he added. "I can't. And so, I hate cancer. But I'm also grateful for it. I tell a lot more truth to myself than I used to do it when I thought I was super omni-competent and interesting."

Sasse's faith is a huge part of his identity, and has been for decades.

In a 2016 interview, he explained how he came to Calvinism.

"In college, I was very involved in evangelical and parachurch groups — Fellowship of Christian Athletes, Campus Crusade (my wife is a former Cru staffer). Although I grew up in the Lutheran tradition and was very involved in FCA in high school, I didn’t have a lot of clarity about the differentiation of theological views inside Protestantism," he said.

Sasse went on to explain that some of the activism he engaged in with his religious community didn't seem to be grounded in faith, which led him to read scholars of religion. It was ultimately that reading that changed the way he looked at his own faith.

In the years since college, Sasse has continued to be open about his faith. And now that he's approaching the end of his life, it seems clear that he'll continue to discuss religion openly until the day he dies.