{"id":50113,"date":"2026-04-02T13:15:23","date_gmt":"2026-04-02T17:15:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/?p=50113"},"modified":"2026-04-02T13:15:23","modified_gmt":"2026-04-02T17:15:23","slug":"we-need-belief-matthew-mcconaughey-wants-americans-to-turn-to-faith","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2026\/04\/we-need-belief-matthew-mcconaughey-wants-americans-to-turn-to-faith.html","title":{"rendered":"\u201cWe need belief.\u201d Matthew McConaughey Wants Americans to Turn to Faith"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure id=\"attachment_50116\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-50116\" style=\"width: 1200px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><a href=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/87\/2026\/04\/Matthew-McConaughey_credit-TODAY-YouTube.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-50116\" src=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/87\/2026\/04\/Matthew-McConaughey_credit-TODAY-YouTube.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1200\" height=\"900\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-50116\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">TODAY \/ YouTube<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>During an appearance on \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.today.com\/video\/matthew-mcconaughey-on-working-with-family-faith-and-politics-260277829666\">Today<\/a>,\u201d actor Matthew McConaughey said America needs more faith. \u201cI was starting to look down my nose and get a little cynical. I was starting to go, \u2018Maybe this is just how it is,\u2019\u201d he said. \u201cI said, \u2018No, I\u2019m not ready to wave the white flag and let doubt win in me.\u2019 I noticed that a lot of people were saying the same thing. We need belief. Whether that\u2019s in God, whether that\u2019s in your kids or your future, your better self, whatever that is, we need more of it and we need to double down on it.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>McConaughey has been open the last few years about his ever-evolving faith. In 2025, he spoke to <a href=\"https:\/\/relevantmagazine.com\/culture\/matthew-mcconaughey-on-how-faith-impacts-his-life\/\"><em>Relevant<\/em><\/a> about how his faith has shifted over the years. \u201cI\u2019m a believer. I believe in God,\u201d he said. \u201cI also, at times in my life, took advantage of the idea of, \u2018Well, it\u2019s all fate. What\u2019s going to happen is going to happen. It\u2019s all been written.\u2019 I had a time where I had a couple of very agnostic years. It wasn\u2019t as much about disbelieving as it was more about telling myself, \u2018Hey, quit chalking things up to fate. You have your hands on the wheel, you\u2019re responsible for your decisions,\u2019\u201d he added. \u201cThat\u2019s why you\u2019ve got free will \u2014 you make the choice for yourself. Your hands are on the wheel.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>McConaughey went on to express the importance of prayer in his life in connecting him to God. He recalled an experience confessing to a monk named Brother Christian. \u201cI confessed to him for four hours,\u201d McConaughey says. \u201cI\u2019m feeling like I\u2019m at the bottom of the earth. I\u2019m bawling and snot\u2019s coming out of my nose. What does he say? The only word he says to me after four hours of my confessions. He looks me in the eyes and he goes: \u2018Me too,\u2019\u201d he said of the profound experience. \u201cHe let me know that I was not the center of the universe. He let me know it was a human condition, what I was going through. God\u2019s not looking for us to come there perfectly. He\u2019s not looking for us to come there all cleaned up and a halo on it. He wants to open the door when we\u2019re groveling.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>McConaughey\u2019s often pluralistic talk makes his far from the ideal Christian icon, but his candid, open approach to faith has made him particularly endearing to the public. \u201cI can tell you from personal experience that at least 90 percent of people I know in the public eye are wildly unimpressive behind closed doors. It&#8217;s all an act. Truly some of the dumbest people on the planet, and I will never apologize for having that opinion,\u201d wrote David Hookstead for <a href=\"https:\/\/www.outkick.com\/culture\/matthew-mcconaughey-beliefs-today-video\"><em>Outkick<\/em><\/a><em>. <\/em>\u201cPeople like McConaughey and Chris Pratt are the exception \u2013 not the rule. How many other actors would go on national TV and tell people that believing in God is a benefit in life?\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>During an appearance on \u201cToday,\u201d actor Matthew McConaughey said America needs more faith. \u201cI was starting to look down my nose and get a little cynical. I was starting to go, \u2018Maybe this is just how it is,\u2019\u201d he said. \u201cI said, \u2018No, I\u2019m not ready to wave the white flag and let doubt win&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":516,"featured_media":50116,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fbia_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-50113","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-television"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>\u201cWe need belief.\u201d Matthew McConaughey Wants Americans to Turn to Faith<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Matthew McConaughey says America needs more faith, urging belief in God, purpose, and personal responsibility in a culture growing cynical.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2026\/04\/we-need-belief-matthew-mcconaughey-wants-americans-to-turn-to-faith.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"\u201cWe need belief.\u201d Matthew McConaughey Wants Americans to Turn to Faith\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Matthew McConaughey says America needs more faith, urging belief in God, purpose, and personal responsibility in a culture growing cynical.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2026\/04\/we-need-belief-matthew-mcconaughey-wants-americans-to-turn-to-faith.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Idol Chatter\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2026-04-02T17:15:23+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/87\/2026\/04\/Matthew-McConaughey_credit-TODAY-YouTube.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1200\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"900\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Cecilia Buchanan\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"\u201cWe need belief.\u201d Matthew McConaughey Wants Americans to Turn to Faith","description":"Matthew McConaughey says America needs more faith, urging belief in God, purpose, and personal responsibility in a culture growing cynical.","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2026\/04\/we-need-belief-matthew-mcconaughey-wants-americans-to-turn-to-faith.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"\u201cWe need belief.\u201d Matthew McConaughey Wants Americans to Turn to Faith","og_description":"Matthew McConaughey says America needs more faith, urging belief in God, purpose, and personal responsibility in a culture growing cynical.","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2026\/04\/we-need-belief-matthew-mcconaughey-wants-americans-to-turn-to-faith.html","og_site_name":"Idol Chatter","article_published_time":"2026-04-02T17:15:23+00:00","og_image":[{"width":1200,"height":900,"url":"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/87\/2026\/04\/Matthew-McConaughey_credit-TODAY-YouTube.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Cecilia Buchanan","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2026\/04\/we-need-belief-matthew-mcconaughey-wants-americans-to-turn-to-faith.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2026\/04\/we-need-belief-matthew-mcconaughey-wants-americans-to-turn-to-faith.html","name":"\u201cWe need belief.\u201d Matthew McConaughey Wants Americans to Turn to Faith","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2026\/04\/we-need-belief-matthew-mcconaughey-wants-americans-to-turn-to-faith.html#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2026\/04\/we-need-belief-matthew-mcconaughey-wants-americans-to-turn-to-faith.html#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/87\/2026\/04\/Matthew-McConaughey_credit-TODAY-YouTube.jpg","datePublished":"2026-04-02T17:15:23+00:00","dateModified":"2026-04-02T17:15:23+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/#\/schema\/person\/450625ec20bf3e8a84060b9321455f3d"},"description":"Matthew McConaughey says America needs more faith, urging belief in God, purpose, and personal responsibility in a culture growing cynical.","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2026\/04\/we-need-belief-matthew-mcconaughey-wants-americans-to-turn-to-faith.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2026\/04\/we-need-belief-matthew-mcconaughey-wants-americans-to-turn-to-faith.html"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2026\/04\/we-need-belief-matthew-mcconaughey-wants-americans-to-turn-to-faith.html#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/87\/2026\/04\/Matthew-McConaughey_credit-TODAY-YouTube.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/87\/2026\/04\/Matthew-McConaughey_credit-TODAY-YouTube.jpg","width":1200,"height":900,"caption":"TODAY \/ YouTube"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2026\/04\/we-need-belief-matthew-mcconaughey-wants-americans-to-turn-to-faith.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"\u201cWe need belief.\u201d Matthew McConaughey Wants Americans to Turn to Faith"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/","name":"Idol Chatter","description":"Beliefnet Entertainment blog, TV blog, Movie blog, Religion in entertainment blog","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/#\/schema\/person\/450625ec20bf3e8a84060b9321455f3d","name":"Brandy Grenier","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/e53\/e53f6ea4c6b15081d4df68e2d7d7750ex96.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/e53\/e53f6ea4c6b15081d4df68e2d7d7750ex96.jpg","caption":"Brandy Grenier"},"url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/author\/bgrenier"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50113","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/516"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=50113"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50113\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":50119,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50113\/revisions\/50119"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/50116"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=50113"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=50113"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=50113"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}