April 22 2002

ARTICLE TOOLS

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Earlier this year, Sheryl Henderson Blunt, our go-to journalist in Washington, D.C., had a brief taste of life in the fast lane as she drove her car through Washington's streets, trailing an Air Force fighter pilot late for a church service. Blunt recalls she followed Lt. Col. Martha McSally through a red light and then the wrong way down a one-way street. "I was a little bit scared for my life," Blunt says. When they arrived safely, the A-10 Warthog pilot who served in the Gulf War joked, "I drive like I fly."

In covering Washington for Christianity Today for the past three years, Blunt has mastered the art of the chase. A 1994 graduate of Wheaton College, Blunt polished her reporting and writing skills at Stars and Stripes and Congressional Quarterly before she took time out for the birth of Carissa, her and husband Matt's first child. About that time, she began free-lancing for CT. When CT caught wind in March that a group of evangelical leaders was about to meet with mega-rock star Bono from the Irish band U2, Blunt jumped on the story and was one of only two journalists to grab post-meeting interviews.

The Bono story posed an unusual challenge. Evangelicals often have a nagging question about celebrities who have made various comments about Jesus but who stop short of the Four Spiritual Laws. What do they believe about God? In Bono's case, much to the surprise of the evangelicals at the meeting, the singer answered that question up-front and affirmed his personal faith in Christ.

"When I met him, he seemed very real, very low key," Blunt says. "I asked people coming out of the meeting [about Bono]. They were very surprised that he seemed very sincere, 'humble' in how he presented himself and what he had to say. They all ...