Angela Flynn has a lot of similarities with her could-be opponent for Congress, current U.S. Rep. Mark Walker.
Both have spent time in professional ministry — both on the music side — and both speak often about their faith and how it affects their policy positions. Both of their fathers were also ministers. Walker (R-Greensboro) entered the 2014 race for the N.C. Sixth Congressional District seat without any prior political experience, and Flynn’s entrance for the 2020 election is her first run for elected office.
“It leaves me with the suspicion that I kind of know Mark Walker,” said Flynn, a Chatham County resident who works as the Director of Liturgy and Music at Immaculate Conception Church in Durham. “I suspect I have some idea of who he is. But I also feel like he’s wandered afield of what I believe he was probably brought up with. I just don’t understand his silence on so many powerful moral issues.”
Flynn, a Democrat, announced her campaign to replace Walker earlier this year but has kept a relatively low profile. She said she’s spent time trying to connect with already-elected legislators at both the state and national level and prepare for a larger launch. Part of that will come this Saturday, when she’s hosting a joint Chatham-Lee launch event.
She admitted, in her own words, that she’s “obviously” a “lunatic” to go straight for one of the highest elected offices in America on her first go-round. But she said it’s where she saw a need.
“I’m surrounded, at home and at work, by people who continue to say, ‘What is going on with our state?’” Flynn said. “I felt like I was being called to try to make an impact.”
So she’s going for it. Flynn’s website states that she’s lived in North Carolina for 25 years and worked in Christian ministry for 20 years. She backs her policy positions — affordable healthcare “as a right for all” and “assuring all workers a just wage” — with her faith and her professional background.
Flynn hopes that next year she can capitalize on unaffiliated voters and “disenchanted Christians” who don’t like what’s happening in D.C. She said the “predominant view of Christianity” has been “grossly skewed,” and that it needs to change.
“The only way that we can counteract that is if those of us who do identify as people of faith — Christian, Jewish, Muslim, be what you will, people who are believers — step forward and refuse to allow a small segment of faith communities to define us,” she said. “I know who I am, and I know what the gospel preaches, and I know what it means to be called to love the most unlovable among us. I felt like that became a responsibility.”
Flynn added that she feels her experience working in a Catholic background can help her build consensus — “I laughingly say that anyone who thinks 20 years of working within the Catholic Church does not prepare you for taking on Congress doesn’t know the Catholic Church,” she said — and provides her a different perspective as a woman and someone who, in her words, has lived more than a half-century.
If another Democrat announces and files for the seat, the N.C. primary is slated for March 3, 2020. The general election is scheduled for November 3, 2020.
Reporter Zachary Horner can be reached at zhorner@chathamnr.com or on Twitter at @ZachHornerCNR.