RACHEL MADDOW: Going public seems to sort of be a theme this week for [South Carolina Governor Mark] Sanford and other associates of C Street, the secretive ministry and living quarters for several members of Congress at which Gov. Sanford and Sen. John Ensign of Nevada both received some sort of counseling during their extramarital affairs. Joining us now is Jeff Sharlet who wrote about ... C Street in his book The Family: The Secret Fundamentalism at the Heart of American Power. While you were undercover in the family doing the reporting for Harper's and for your book, you actually attended a meeting between Congressman [Rep. Todd Tiahrt, Republican of Kansas] and Doug Coe, who is the long-time leader of the family. What happened at that meeting and what impression did you get of Mr. Tiahrt's position in the family? SHARLET: Yes. It was a spiritual counseling session, precisely the sort that Ensign and Sanford were having. Tiahrt also sort of had sex on the brain but of a different sort. He was very concerned with the number of babies Muslims are having. He said Americans are killing too many of their babies while Muslims are having too many, and we need to have more babies and outlaw abortion so that we can win the race with the Muslims. What happened was that Doug Coe, the leader of the family, said that's fine as far as it goes, but doesn't go far enough. He said to Congressman Tiahrt, "I want you to think bigger. I want you to think of Jesus plus nothing," that's what he said. It's a phrase they mean to suggest something they call the totalitarianism of Christ. I think he was introducing Tiahrt into the sort of the advanced lessons of the family.