Adam Hamilton, senior pastor of the Church of the Resurrection in the Kansas City area, is running as the Democratic nominee for a U.S. Senate seat from Kansas. If elected, he would attempt to continue serving as pastor while holding a Senate position, a combination achieved in the past century by only one sitting senator: Raphael Warnock of Georgia.
Warnock was elected as Georgia’s first Black senator in 2021 and has continued to serve as senior pastor of Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta since then, preaching regularly. Hamilton has indicated he would like to preach 12 to 18 times annually at his congregation, which the Church of the Resurrection claims is the nation’s largest United Methodist church with approximately 25,000 members. Warnock has described integrating his political and pastoral work as aligned in purpose, stating both involve working for people and extending ministry beyond the sanctuary into the broader community.
Other ordained ministers have served in the Senate in recent decades, though none while actively leading their own congregations. John Danforth, an Episcopal priest and Republican senator from Missouri who served from 1976 to 1995, has been cited by Hamilton as an inspiration. Hamilton also pointed to Baptist pastor Tim Hutchinson, who served in the Senate from 1997 to 2003, and James Lankford, a Southern Baptist minister who has represented Oklahoma in the Senate since 2015. Lankford previously worked as president of a Baptist conference center and youth camp.
Historically, clergy have served more frequently in the House than the Senate. Notable examples include civil rights leaders such as Adam Clayton Powell Jr., who represented Harlem in the House while pastoring Abyssinian Baptist Church, and Walter Fauntroy and William Gray, who combined pastoral work with House service. Emanuel Cleaver, a Methodist minister, served as pastor while representing Kansas City in the House beginning in 2005. Robert Drinan, a Jesuit priest and Massachusetts Democrat, served in the House from 1971 until stepping down after Pope John Paul II prohibited Catholic priests from holding political office.
Protestants have constituted the overwhelming majority of clergy in Congress, with Frederick Muhlenberg, a Lutheran minister, serving as the first Speaker of the House from 1789 to 1797. Hiram Rhodes Revels, an African Methodist Episcopal minister, became the first African American elected to Congress in 1870. Several clergy from both major parties have been nominated for House races this cycle, including Baptist pastor Frederick Haynes III and other Protestant ministers.
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