Candace Cameron Bure Wants to Put Christianity Back in Christmas Movies

Ms. Bure isn’t just selling a made-for-TV moment, but a Christian epiphany for the masses.

In recent years, the actress has reigned as the secular Christmas rom-com queen of the Hallmark Channel. But earlier this year, she left the TV-movie giant for a more sweeping role at Great American Family, an upstart cable channel that is positioning itself as the God-and-country alternative for holiday entertainment.

“My heart wants to tell stories that have more meaning and purpose and depth behind them,” said Ms. Bure, who is 46 years old. “I knew that the people behind Great American Family were Christians that love the Lord and wanted to promote faith programming and good family entertainment.”

Christmas movies on the small screen represent a booming business generating at least $500 million in ad revenue each year, according to industry analysts. These days, the genre that Hallmark pioneered is everywhere, from major streaming platforms like

Netflix

to more niche channels like the Food Network and HGTV. While the movies may differ, most share an abiding reluctance to dwell on Christianity.

Great American Family enters the scene with the opposite point of view. With a name that conjures red-state pride and content that embraces faith, the channel is presenting itself as the choice for Christians who think Hollywood is ruining Christmas. Ms. Bure, a former child star best known as D.J. Tanner from “Full House,” is the religious influencer who serves as its face. 

‘She’s the Key Piece in What We’re Doing’

“Spiritual or faith-based content is grossly underserved,” said

Bill Abbott,

chief executive of Great American Media, who oversees the new network. When he discussed his channel on a podcast from the lifestyle site Family Savvy recently, he referred to the entertainment business as “a sewer.”

The former chief executive of Hallmark Channel parent company Crown Media Family Networks, Mr. Abbott has helped guide Ms. Bure’s career for 15 years.

Great American Family, then called GAC Family, launched as a rebranded network last year. Discovery Inc. sold the country music and lifestyle outlet Great American Country to a company formed by Mr. Abbott with Hicks Equity Partners. The firm is owned by the family of Thomas Hicks Jr., co-chairman of the Republican National Committee. Mr. Abbott said the firm owns a small minority stake in the business and that the channel doesn’t take any political positions. Hicks Equity Partners declined to comment.

The channel’s formula is what Mr. Abbott calls “soft faith,” a Christian message he said is there for viewers who are looking for it but doesn’t aim to proselytize. Great American Family also offers holiday films that follow conventional secular story lines: The New York advertising hotshot who falls in love while trying to sell the family farm, the luxury travel blogger who stumbles into romance at a bed-and-breakfast, and the like.

In “A Christmas…Present,” Ms. Bure’s go-getter real-estate agent Maggie has hit a bumpy patch in her marriage. With her husband and two children, she visits her brother Paul, a recent widower whose late wife brought him into the church’s fold. Paul repeatedly praises Christianity to his stressed-out sister, certain that he’ll be reunited with his wife in the afterlife and grateful to his faith for getting him through the loss. “One of God’s greatest gifts, and it doesn’t require wrapping,” he says. 

Mr. Abbott has hired Hallmark talent, including stars Danica McKellar, best known as Winnie Cooper from “The Wonder Years,” and “Full House” alum Lori Loughlin. Ms. Loughlin, who played Aunt Becky on the show and spent two months in prison for her part in a 2019 nationwide college-admissions scheme, will appear in a Great American Family movie in January. In an interview with Variety, Mr. Abbott called her “America’s sweetheart, regardless of whatever happened.”

Ms. Bure’s participation in the network, he said, was essential. “For me, she’s the key piece of what we’re doing,” he said. 

In her book “Reshaping It All,” Ms. Bure described the period between child stardom and her adult career as difficult. She often felt isolated, dropped in random cities to follow future husband Val Bure, a Russian-American professional hockey player, as he pursued his career. In the midst of this loneliness, she developed an eating disorder.

Her bingeing and purging started in Montreal while living unmarried with Mr. Bure “as a good Christian girl ought not to do,” she recalled in the book, one of several she has published. “I ran to comfort food instead of running to God.”

She reached out to her brother Kirk Cameron, a former child star from the sitcom “Growing Pains,” who directed her to “The Way of the Master,” a book by Christian author Ray Comfort. After reading it, she too became a vocal Christian.

Using their sitcom names, Mr. Cameron said he felt humbled that God “can even use Mike Seaver to nudge D.J. Tanner to love the Lord with all her heart, mind, soul and strength.”

Ms. McKellar said her life changed dramatically thanks to both Mr. Abbott, who revived her career, and Ms. Bure, who gave her a Candace Cameron Bure-brand Bible and took her to a Palm Sunday passion play. After that, she found her faith, a religious journey she shares on the network’s app. “We’re really here to spread joy and to spread love and happy, good feelings,” she said of the channel’s mission.

Ms. Bure is skilled at melding her perky personal brand with her outspoken style of Christianity, a mix she calls “mindstyle” on her website. On social media, she promotes her

QVC

fashion collection one minute, quotes scripture the next. Her Bibles come in beachy colors. She does her own twist on TikTok memes, like the one where she dances in a leotard and cat nose while pretending to kick Satan in the crotch.

At Great American Family, Ms. Bure is now the chief creative officer, which allows her to produce religious titles under the “Candace Cameron Bure Presents” banner. She is involved in content creation and curation across many genres. For this season, Ms. Bure produced a secular film, “Christmas on Candy Cane Lane,” starring former “Full House” castmate Andrea Barber. “I’m so happy to have Candace be my guiding light,” Ms. Barber said. “I thanked her every single day.”

‘Running to God’ 

Ms. Bure was born in Los Angeles to Robert and Barbara Cameron. She began auditioning by five years old and soon landed small sitcom roles and TV ads. In 1987, at the age of 10, she got her break on “Full House,” which starred Bob Saget as widower Danny Tanner raising his three daughters with the help of his brother-in-law and his best friend. On the sitcom, she played D.J., the eldest Tanner sister, until the show’s finale in 1995. 

After a decade of motherhood, she returned to acting in 2008 with her first Hallmark movie, followed by more TV roles and a turn on “Dancing with the Stars.” In 2016, she reprised D.J. on “Fuller House,” which ran for five seasons. By then, she was well into her Christmas movie career.

“I knew she was going to grow up to run the world someday, and she’s getting close to it,” said John Stamos, who played Uncle Jesse on “Full House.” Even as a child star, he said, she was an old soul.

Ms. Bure became a co-host on “The View” in 2015. While on the daytime talk show, her opinions made her a cultural lightning rod. In one episode, for example, she defended an Oregon bakery that refused to make a same-sex couple a wedding cake. “We do have the right to still choose who we associate with,” she said. In 2016, she announced her exit from the show.

Mr. Abbott, who brought her into the holiday-movie world, is also no stranger to the culture wars. During his tenure at Hallmark, which was marked by tremendous growth, the channel drew criticism that its programming was slow to embrace diversity. Then in late 2019, Mr. Abbott refused to air commercials for the wedding-planning website Zola that featured brides kissing, sparking outrage and sending #BoycottHallmark trending on Twitter. Hallmark apologized to viewers and reinstated the ad. Mr. Abbott left the network soon after, without explanation.

Mr. Abbott said the timing was coincidental and he left in search of a new challenge. 

Ms. Bure declined to discuss her departure from Hallmark beyond saying: “It basically is a completely different network than when I started because of the change of leadership.” 

Hallmark executives declined to comment on Great American Family. A spokeswoman for Hallmark emphasized the network’s commitment to storytelling that reflects diverse perspectives. “We want all viewers to see themselves in our programming and everyone is welcome,” the spokeswoman said.   

Great American Family pushes both Mr. Abbott and Ms. Bure deeper into culturally conservative territory as other networks are taking steps to trumpet diversity. Next month, Hallmark debuts “The Holiday Sitter,” the G-rated network’s first original holiday film solely focused on an LGBT love story. Asked if she expects her new channel to feature same-sex couples as leads in holiday movies, Ms. Bure said no. “I think that Great American Family will keep traditional marriage at the core,” she said.

Mr. Abbott was vague in his thoughts on the subject. “It’s certainly the year 2022, so we’re aware of the trends,” he said. “There’s no whiteboard that says, ‘Yes, this’ or ‘No, we’ll never go here.’” 

Ms. Bure’s channel-switch comes with risks. The small network isn’t included in many basic cable packages, and it lacks an exclusive streaming platform. Its prime-time audience is a fraction of Hallmark’s, drawing roughly 333,000 live total viewers for last month’s premiere of “Destined at Christmas” compared with 1.89 million who tuned in for Hallmark’s “We Wish You a Married Christmas” the same night. People who don’t know where to find Great American Family’s holiday movies are instructed to text CHRISTMAS to a phone number or check the channel’s website. 

Ms. Bure, a mother of three who lives with her husband in Malibu, Calif., said she hopes all viewers can appreciate her movie’s message, which calls for people to slow down and savor moments with loved ones. “I want to be able to tell that story in a beautiful way, but also that is not off-putting to the unbeliever or someone who shares a different faith,” she said. 

At first, the set of “A Christmas…Present”—out Nov. 27—looks like that of a typical holiday movie, fulfilling the industry’s unofficial rule requiring “Christmas in every frame.” Two crew members lay down snow outside the church, actually a white ground cover under fluffy bits of white paper. One carries a bucket patrolling for bald spots. For falling snow, they use a bubble machine whose output resembles flurries on-screen.

In the pivotal scene that the production is shooting, Ms. Bure’s Maggie, who avoids religion, rushes to the church to deliver a pie. That’s when she experiences a revelation.

The crew grapples with what they call the “God light,” or the flickering beam that comes during Ms. Bure’s spiritual interlude. A crew member objects when the light gets too bright, too fast. “That’s a little Hallelujah-ish,” he says. A producer fixes the heavy church door, whose jarring slam keeps killing the vibe. A crew member inhales a snow bubble and coughs. 

Ms. Bure said the channel gave her the freedom to make a holiday movie that wasn’t a rom-com, dispensing with the snowball fights, peppermint-cocoa snuggles and other tropes.

“My own kids have said, ‘Mom, are you leaving the big city and going to the farm, meeting the love of your life?’” Ms. Bure said, adding that she still plans to appear in those types of movies in the future. “Those are all fun things that we love, but we see over and over and over.”

Write to Ellen Gamerman at ellen.gamerman@wsj.com