but spent much of her early adult life as an atheist. In her mid-30s, she became an evangelical Christian. The process of conversion began when she dated a Christian man, who introduced her to the Redeemer Presbyterian Church in New York City and the teachings of its pastor, Tim Keller, and culminated in an experience on a trip to Taiwan in 2006, where she later wrote she "woke up in what felt like a strange cross between a dream and reality. Jesus came to me and said, 'Here I am.'" She has called her conversion "a bit of a mind bender" due to her political beliefs and former atheism, and prefers the term "orthodox Christian" over "evangelical" to describe herself, given the cultural baggage around the latter term. She has said that the biggest impact her new-found faith had on her political beliefs was that she came to "view everyone as God's child, and that means everyone deserves grace and respect". On October 10, 2015, Powers was received into the Catholic Church. On November 16, 2016, Powers announced her engagement to fellow journalist Robert Draper. References External links The Daily Beast column USA Today column The American Prospect column New York Post column The Wall Street Journal column Salon column The Washington Spectator column The Huffington Post blog entries 1967 births Living people 20th-century American Episcopalians 20th-century American journalists 20th-century American non-fiction writers 20th-century American women writers 20th-century atheists 21st-century American journalists 21st-century American non-fiction writers 21st-century American women writers 21st-century atheists 21st-century Presbyterians 21st-century Protestants 21st-century Roman Catholics Alaska Democrats American columnists American feminist writers American people of Irish descent American political commentators American political journalists American political writers American women bloggers American bloggers Catholics from Alaska Catholics from New York (state) Clinton administration personnel CNN people Converts to Protestantism from atheism or agnosticism Converts to Roman Catholicism from Calvinism Former Anglicans Former evangelicals Former Presbyterians Fox News people Georgetown University Law Center alumni HuffPost writers and columnists Journalists from Alaska Journalists from New York (state) New York (state) Democrats New York Post people Newsweek people American opinion journalists Salon (website) people University of Maryland, College Park alumni USA Today journalists The Wall Street Journal people American women columnists Writers from Fairbanks, Alaska Writers from New York (state) Place of birth missing (living people)