There is a moment during a recent interview between “Jeopardy!” host Ken Jennings and comedian W. Kamau Bell in the latter’s “Who’s With Me?” podcast when the two shift their focus away from the game show and toward Jennings himself, zeroing in on his political and religious beliefs.

It’s at this moment that the tone changes. The jokes become less frequent and airy. Answers to questions grow longer. Pretty soon the listener realizes that the affable know-it-all with a “Leave It to Beaver” aesthetic is deeply earnest — and maybe a bit angry.

Jennings, whose 2004 74-match winning streak has yet to be replicated, is one of the most visible members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. He has been a critic on social media of the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown and an avowed supporter of rights for transgender individuals.

“It’s stuff that affects me and my family, you know?” he tells Bell in the Sept. 9 episode. “Law enforcement kidnapping my neighbors, that affects me. My trans friends and family not having the same rights … these things actually affect me. It’s not a soapbox, and it’s not performative.”

Bell, a former “Celebrity Jeopardy!” contestant, applauds Jennings for speaking out, acknowledging that the host’s apolitical employers likely preferred he didn’t. What Bell doesn’t mention is that the same may very well be true of Jennings’ religious leaders, particularly when it comes to issues regarding the transgender community.

The church’s “family proclamation” states that gender represents an “essential characteristic of individual premortal, mortal, and eternal identity and purpose.” The faith’s top leader, President Dallin H. Oaks, and its General Handbook have stated that “gender” refers to one’s “biological sex at birth.”

In practice, this means lay clergy are directed to discourage members from transitioning in any form. As well, they are to instruct members to attend gender-specific meetings and activities that align with their assigned sex at birth.

‘It’s rough out there right now’

Jennings, who credits his faith with grounding him in the wake of his rise to fortune and fame, clearly cares about the topic.

“Honestly, I don’t think there’s an issue today I care about on a personal level more deeply than trans rights,” Jennings wrote on social media in August. “And it’s rough out there right now. Bigots on one side of the political aisle and too many cowards on the other.”

In the same interview with Bell, Jennings also laments “women not having the same health rights they did for 50 years” and suggests listeners donate to the Center for Reproductive Rights, aimed at protecting, among other things, legal access to abortion.

The church, meanwhile, counsels members “not to submit to, perform, encourage, pay for or arrange” elective abortions sought for “personal or social convenience.” It does allow for exceptions in cases of rape or incest, when the mother’s life or health is in jeopardy, or when the fetus has serious defects that will not allow the baby to survive beyond birth.

Church is not a ‘monolith’

Jennings, a graduate of church-owned Brigham Young University who served a two-year mission in Spain, does not downplay his belief or distance himself from the faith. Instead, he places himself squarely within a fold that, he emphasizes, is “not a monolith.”

“It’s actually a very conservative-leaning institution. But the thing about Mormons, or Latter-day Saints, it’s very geographically dependent,” he says. “If you’re imagining a Mormon in a small town, a rancher in Idaho, or a small town, like your stereotype of somebody with very conservative views might be right. That’s why there are a lot of conservative Mormons, because there are a lot of Mormons in the Mountain West. Those are red states.”

But, he notes, “if you went to my Mormon congregation tomorrow in Seattle, it would look very different from a small Idaho town. It would be apolitical, of course, but if you asked people how they voted, it would not be the same as that mythical small Idaho town.”

Jennings says he speaks out on some issues partly because of his religion.

“When I say that I have convictions of right and wrong that run deeper than my desire to keep my extremely well-paid job, and if I ever had to choose, I would go with the convictions,” he says, “that’s all from my church upbringing.”