Reality TV stars Chip and Joanna Gaines have made headlines this week after a new television production from their network showcased a same-sex couple and their children. 

Produced by the Magnolia Network, the series, entitled Back to the Frontier, made its debut on HBO Max on July 10. The show follows three couples tending to life as 19th-century homesteaders, with no internet or television. The couples include two men, Jason and Joe Hanna-Riggs, a same-sex couple raising two boys. 

Once known for their promotion of Christian values, the new show by Chip and Joanna Gaines has riled several Christian commentators and conservative outlets, including the organization Them Before Us, which took to social media July 11 to write:

Magnolia once stood for faith and family. Now their new show features a same-sex couple who purchased children via surrogacy, cutting them off from their biological mother. ... This isn’t inclusion. It’s injustice.

The American Family Association also took note of the promotion of the same-sex lifestyle, stating on social media, “This is sad and disappointing, because Chip and Joanna Gaines have been very influential in the evangelical community."

Ed Vitagliano, vice president of the association, expounded in greater detail, writing: 

Moreover, in the past, they have stood firm on the sanctity of marriage regardless of the personal cost that has entailed. We aren’t sure why the Gaines have reversed course, but we are sure of this: Back to the Frontier promotes an unbiblical view of human sexuality, marriage, and family –– a view no Christian should embrace.

Some wondered if the move was more the production house, not the couple directly, but on Sunday, Chip Gaines took to X (formerly known as Twitter) to respond directly to the backlash:

Talk, ask qustns, listen.. maybe even learn. Too much to ask of modern American Christian culture. Judge 1st, understand later/never It’s a sad sunday when ‘non believers’ have never been confronted with hate or vitriol until they are introduced to a modern American Christian.

Christian influencer and podcaster Allie Beth Stuckey was quick to respond to Gaine's tweet, saying: 

Chip: You can’t out-love God. God is love, which means 2 things: 1) He gets to define it. 2) Everything He says and does He says and does in love. In 1 Corinthians 13:6, He says that love, among other things, “never rejoices in wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth.” You are rejoicing in wrongdoing & rejecting the truth by choosing to glorify that which God calls sin—a disordered desire that hurts the body and soul of those who are ruled by it (Romans 1:26-32). Thus you are neither loving God nor loving people by this decision.  If God is love, then in love, He created marriage as exclusively between one man and one woman. This is the only kind of marriage God calls good. Jesus affirms this in Matthew 19. Every kind of sexuality outside of this union He calls sin. Sin hurts people, and it angers the God you say you serve. The least loving thing possible is to normalize it. Remember: the most loving thing we can do in every situation is agree with God.

Matt Walsh of The Daily Wire, who has spearheaded several online campaigns in an attempt to safeguard children from the dangers of transgenderism, responded, saying, "Maybe you should endeavor to understand the basic moral teachings of your own alleged religion before you give lectures to other people about their lack of understanding."

Christian sports media digital influencer Jon Root also took to social media, asking the question: "Why do Christians keep compromising on this issue?"

Chip responded to Root on X, quoting 1 Peter 3:15: “But in your hearts revere Christ as Lord. Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect” (1 Peter 3:15).

The verse in Scripture prompted pro-family author and writer Katy Faust to point out: 

Can you ‘revere Christ as Lord’ while normalizing a household where children will never be able to obey the 5th commandment because two men: - bought their genetic mother - rented their birth mother - are starving them of daily maternal love,’ and added, ‘It's not the Internet to whom you will need to give an answer, Chip.

Why are so many incensed over this new series? It stems back nine years, when the couple was making a name for themselves with Home and Garden TV's Fixer Upper. At the time, the snarky (mostly progressive) online outlet Buzzfeed wrote a piece attacking the happily married Christian couple with four kids for attending a church that taught the truth of the Bible, i.e., that marriage is only between a man and a woman, and that homosexual actions are wrong. 

Our own Msgr. Charles Pope saw the hit piece and wrote a blog responding to  the fact that the couple was then being targeted by LGBT activists. At the time, the Archdiocese of Washington priest wrote: 

It is unclear as I write this whether the demand for clarification of the personal views of Chip and Joanna Gaines will go anywhere. Will HGTV give in to demands that Chip and Joanna disclose their personal views? Will HGTV give in to demands that their show feature ‘gay’ couples from time to time?

The following year in 2017, Chip and Joanna Gaines spoke openly about their Christian faith, telling the Billy Graham Evangelization Association, "Our family has made a commitment to put Christ first, a lifestyle our parents modeled for us very well. They showed us how to keep our marriage and family centered around God. As for 'Fixer Upper,' we have been surprised at the impact of our faith through the show."

"We haven't been overtly evangelical, but the rich feedback we have received on family and love all source from our faith. Jesus said the world would know His disciples by their love for one another, and we've glimpsed this in practice and strive for it every day," Chip said during an interview. 

And now, nearly 10 years later, the couple has reversed course. Asking Msgr. Pope to weigh in on the new controversy, he told the Register via email: 

It is sadly common that many who initially hold firm to biblical teaching regarding sexuality and marriage eventually give way under a torrent of pressure from many sectors. This includes, not only the LGBTQUI activists, but also corporate sponsors, the legal community who threaten legal action, and peers in the media and entertainment world.

And did the couple cave to outside forces? Msgr. Pope said:

It is possible that Chip and Joanna Gaines may have succumbed to this pressure. Almost no one likes the tension of standing firm and receiving a barrage of criticism and labels such as intolerant, unkind, bigoted, homophobic, etc. But sadly, the cultural left is effective at applying it and we are less effective at staying in a supportive role. As such, many not only give way to this pressure but are also persuaded that they were wrong or somehow bad for ever having ‘thought that way.’ This happens because it  gets rid of the tension they feel. And thus, God's teachings which they sincerely defended are set aside for a moralism of mere kindness and being 'nice.'

This is also a topic that our newly elected American-born Pope has taken up in years past. Back in 2012, Pope Leo XIV, then-Bishop Robert Prevost, observed during the Synod on Evangelization: 

Western mass media is extraordinarily effective in fostering within the general public enormous sympathy for beliefs and practices that are at odds with the Gospel — for example, abortion, homosexual lifestyle, euthanasia. ... The sympathy is so ... ingrained that when people hear the Christian message, it often inevitably seems ideological and emotionally cruel by contrast to the ostensible humaneness of the anti-Christian perspective.

And as the wisdom of the ages doesn't change despite the shifting winds of secularism, the advice that Msgr. Pope offered to Register readers nine years ago still rings true: "The intensity, frequency, and absurdity of the attacks on people of traditional Christian faith are increasing. Stay vigilant and vocal, faithful Catholics!"