Jennifer Garner would have loved to have become a minister: ‘My mom still thinks I will be!’

10 May 2023

Jennifer Garner would have loved to have been a minister.

Jennifer Garner would have loved to have been a minister

The ‘Elektra’ actress, 51, who takes children Violet, 17, and Seraphina, 14 – who she had with her 50-year-old former husband Ben Affleck – to church, added her mum still thinks she may still swap careers and take up holy work.

She told the latest issue of Allure magazine: “I would have really liked being a minister. My mom thinks I still will be. I grew up in such a lovely church in the United Methodist Church, and the minister was like the den parent.”

Jennifer added about identifying with the creative side of theology: “What I like about the study of religion, it reminds me of the study of theatre – it’s really a liberal arts education.

“You have to understand history, geography, literature. It’s art, it’s everything. I don’t know anything about Hinduism, Islam, so many other religions, and I wish I did. That feels like a sign of respect.”

Jennifer went on about how she thinks the church brings together communities: “I think the more you engage, the more you learn about different ways that people believe and worship, the more you can sit next to anyone and be a neighbour.

“There’s such value in that to me. I don’t know that I will ever be someone who is writing a sermon Sunday morning, but I like the idea of it. I like the idea of going back to divinity school.”

Jennifer’s eldest daughter teaches Sunday school and the actress said she still holds on to the words from one church service she witnessed as a child.

She said: “As a kid, my family and I, we always referenced this one beautiful sermon, where our minister talked about taking something hard that had happened and imagining yourself going down to the banks of the river and fashioning a beautiful box out of what you find there and placing this hurt carefully in the box and watching it float down the river. The power of letting go. Don’t carry it. Just let it go.

“So many times, my sisters and I have said, ‘You need to put that in the river.’ “I’m not coming from a place of, ‘I have this unshakeable faith that I have to share.’ It’s coming from a human place – a place of respect and curiosity.”