Matt hasn’t been the only one in recent seasons to bring his faith into the competition. Fans were surprised to learn Tayshia Adams eliminated Ivan Hall on season 16 of The Bachelorette due to differing beliefs.
According to Ivan, the two didn’t see eye-to-eye on religion, which he claimed was a deal-breaker for her. “All the girls I have dated in the past, it never ended because of religion or anything, but I know that’s something that’s important to you,” he told Tayshia onscreen.
He later shared more details of their conversation on the Off the Vine podcast, saying, “I knew we were going to have to talk about it eventually because I could tell she was, at least, Christian.”
“But we hadn’t talked about it in the past. But she said maybe once to me that she relied on her faith a lot,” he continued, adding The Bachelorette star brought up the topic in the Fantasy Suite. “Tayshia was like, ‘So what do you think about raising kids with religion and what not?’ And that’s when we dove into it. And I kind of explained to Tayshia, ‘Listen, I’m agnostic. A lot of people confuse it for being an atheist. Atheist is not what I am.'”
He added, “She wanted to date someone who is Christian. And that’s completely fine.”
Despite how sensitive a subject religion is, Robert told Nick they won’t shy away from it if any of their leads feels it’s important to them. Simply put, “If people want to discuss religion, they should and we absolutely should air it.”
