Reverend Babs Miller, a minister at Texas Democrat James Talarico’s church, has questioned several traditional Christian doctrines in footage reported by the Daily Wire and Daily Mail. She disputed the idea that Jesus died to atone for sins, rejected the Virgin Birth as a possible borrowing from pagan traditions, and expressed uncertainty over whether Jesus historically existed.

Miller, ordained in 2014 and describing herself as an “out chaplain lesbian”, said Jesus’s historical existence was ultimately unimportant and suggested Christianity may have been invented. The remarks have intensified Republican attacks on Talarico, a Christian and seminary student who frequently invokes Jesus in political arguments; opponent Ken Paxton’s campaign portrays the controversy, alongside Talarico’s past comments such as “God is nonbinary”, as evidence he rejects traditional Christianity.