Article By Toni Rothson // EEW Magazine Online // Marriage

As previously reported by EEW Magazine Online, a lot of Niecy Nash’s conservative Christian fans are struggling to process the surprise announcement that she married a woman. They’re asking: What does that mean? Is she gay? Has she been hiding her sexuality all this time? Were her two other marriages to men built upon a foundation of deception?

In a new issue of PEOPLE, the professing Christian and former first lady, 50, is answering those questions and defending her decision to jump the broom with wife Jessica Betts.

Nash, who finalized her divorce from her second husband Jay Tucker in March, told the publication that her same-sex marriage “has absolutely nothing to do with gender, and it has everything to do with her soul,” saying of Betts, "She is the most beautiful soul I have ever met in my life."

For shocked fans wondering if the Claws actress has been somehow trapped in the closet for years and keeping her gayness a secret all along, she had this to say: "I was not suppressing my sexuality my whole life. I love who I love. At one point in my life, I married twice, and I love those people. And today, I love this person.”

In the eyes of the group of Christians that believe marriage should only be between a man and a woman, and homosexuality is a sinful abomination to God, Nash’s marriage does not gel with her faith.

Despite those opinions that have been voiced loudly across the Internet recently, the Emmy-nominated star is making it clear that her choices are based entirely on what she wants to do at this time – and nothing else.

“I've done everything I wanted to do on my own terms and my own way. So my choice now in a partner has nothing to do with who I've always been. It's a matter of who I am in this moment,” Nash said.

"I don’t feel like my marriage is my coming out of anywhere but rather a going into myself and being honest about who I love," she continued. "And I’m not limiting myself on what that love is supposed to look like.”

Betts, a 41-year-old singer-songwriter, initially linked up with her new spouse on social media in 2015 – a time when Nash says she was “happily married" to her ex-husband.

The two were only “friends,” and Nash told PEOPLE, “I never saw her as someone I would date.”

However, once the When They See Us actress split from her ex in October 2019, “something shifted” in their relationship.

“We began to see each other in a way we never had before,” she explained.

That shift was not made known to the public until Aug. 31 when, in a social media post, the entertainer announced she had wed Betts. Before uploading the marriage announcement with the hashtag #LoveWins, Nash had never given any indication that she was romantically linked to Betts or that she ever was same-sex attracted.

Recently, in a four-part UMC.tv docuseries, “Behind Her Faith,” Nash revealed that she was devastated when her first marriage to a pastor fell apart. She struggled to deal with the pain and had a “dark cloud” over her.

But now, she told PEOPLE, “I couldn’t be happier.”