Denzel Washington Earns Minister’s License: ‘There’s Nothing [God] Can’t Do For You’
By Movieguide® Contributor
Denzel Washington is closing out this year with a new title — the movie star just received his minister’s license.
“In one week I turn 70,” the GLADIATOR II said at the event, per Variety. “It took a while but I’m here. If [God] can do this for me, there’s nothing He can’t do for you. The sky literally is the limit.”
Washington’s wife Pauletta also spoke at the event, saying, “I’m very proud of you. You are the head of our house and you have set a great example for our children, who are now adult children who know the difference because we have shown them the difference.”
Archbishop Christopher Bryant shared photos from the event, where Washington was also baptized.
“We celebrate the addition of Minister Denzel Washington into the clergy, having received his minister’s license in the Church of God in Christ today, in a truly uplifting moment,” Bryant’s post reads. “Both the baptism and the licensing took place at the Historic Kelly Temple in NYC, a place close to his heart. Denzel Washington attended this church as a child and testified to being filled with the Holy Spirit after visiting another church with actor Robert Townsend in the 80’s.”
Washington wrote about his faith in a recent piece for Esquire, describing the moment he was “filled with the Holy Spirit.”
“I also grew up in the church. Always in church,” he wrote. “And I would see the altar calls as a child, which to a little boy just looks like people come up and then they take them into the prayer room. I knew what that was — people being saved — but I didn’t really know.”
After a visit to a Los Angeles church with friend Robert Townsend, Washington allowed people to pray over him.
“I was just feeling. It felt like I was getting lifted up,” he explained. “I can’t exactly describe it. And I was blabbering, and kept blabbering, because I was filled with the Holy Spirit.”
Now, that faith informs Washington’s life and career.
“I’ve always been led by God, and most of my performances are faith filled,” the actor wrote. “Even if I was playing the devil. I still have my shooting script from TRAINING DAY, and I wrote on the cover: “The wages of sin is death.” The wages of sin is death. And now all these years later in GLADIATOR II, I play another bad guy in another great movie. Even in the darkest stories, I’m looking for the light.”
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