In a surprising turn of events, Christian actress Candace Cameron Bure has said she's open to having LGBT topics featured on "Fuller House," the sequel series to the 1987-95 sitcom "Full House" in which she plays D.J. Tanner.
According to a report from Deadline, Bure appeared alongside co-stars Jodie Sweetin and Andrea Barber, and executive producers Jeff Franklin and Robert Boyett at a Television Critics Association panel discussion in Los Angeles earlier this month.
During the discussion, the group was asked if "Fuller House" might feature storylines about equal marriage rights. In response, Franklin said that the historically family-friendly series could "possibly" eventually feature an episode about same-sex marriage.
In turn, Bure was reportedly "asked outright" about her willingness to appear in such a storyline, as she made headlines last year after defending the Christian baker who refused to sell a wedding cake to a same sex couple during a segment on "The View".
"I'm always defending religious freedom and that's what I was talking about on "The View". I didn't describe my personal feelings about that," the typically socially conservative actress clarified.
"But," she continued, "I'm an actress on a television show and I support all things that we go through as human beings and would love all our characters to explore whatever issues that are current in our culture and our society today and I'm 100% on board with that."
As previously reported by The Gospel Herald, Bure debated with "The View" co-host Raven Symoné back in July after Symoné, who outed herself as a lesbian in 2014, over the case of Oregon bakers Aaron and Melissa Klein, who were ordered to pay $135,000 to a lesbian couple for refusing to bake a cake for wedding ceremony.
"[The bakery] didn't refuse to bake the cake because of [the couple's] sexual orientation," Bure said. "In fact, they baked cakes for them previously. They had a problem with the actual ceremony because that - the ceremony - is what conflicted with their religious beliefs. They are saying that they stand for marriage between a man and a woman."
The actress further defended religious freedom while discussing the story of a high school football coach who defied a lawsuit threat demanding he stop praying on the field after games.
"The separation of church and state does not mean that we cannot pray publicly," Bure said back in October. "It actually guarantees our free exercise of religion so that if it is voluntary, we are allowed to pray wherever we would like to."
She added, "If people would actually put more effort into prayer than to fight prayer, you would see a whole difference in this country to see that power of prayer."
