Even Chuck Norris’s granddaughter bought into the memes that described her Papa as indestructible. He was, as she wrote recently, the man who “counted to infinity twice, the man who got bit by a cobra and the cobra died.” Chuck Norris didn’t do pushups, she added; he “would push the earth down.”
Norris, the famed martial artist and old-school action hero, died Thursday, March 19, at the age of 86. His family confirmed the “sudden passing” a day later, amid reports of a brief hospitalization in Hawaii.
Yet Norris seemed destined to live on as a sort of mythical figure—a one-time underdog who’d conquered several lives: Air Force veteran, martial arts expert, big-screen lawman, accidental internet hero and, in more recent years, advocate for conservative values and his Christian faith.
Chuck Norris doesn’t worry about high gas prices; his vehicles run on fear.
Born Carlos Ray Norris on March 10, 1940, in Oklahoma, the bearded actor was originally named after Carlos Berry, a local minister who’d impacted Norris’s father, according to the Hollywood Walk of Fame. “Chuck” became Norris’s lasting moniker just as he reached adulthood, around the time he was stationed in South Korea as an air policeman.
The oldest of three brothers, Norris later described his upbringing as challenging: His mother was a devout Christian credited for her frequent prayers, but his father battled alcoholism. His parents divorced when he was 16, and his younger brother, Wieland, was killed in Vietnam in 1970. So Norris found more purpose overseas, training in Tang Soo Do, a martial art often dubbed “Korean Karate.”
Norris’s fast growth as a fighter led him to international tournaments, where he eventually crossed paths with Hong Kong’s Bruce Lee, one of the most influential martial artists of all time. Soon the two costarred in The Way of the Dragon, a box office smash for its blend of combat and comedy, and Norris began headlining a string of his own action movies throughout the ’70s and ’80s.
As his beard thickened, so did his influence. It perhaps culminated when he parlayed a cult-classic part in Lone Wolf McQuade (1983), a modern Western featuring Norris as a no-nonsense ex-Marine, into an eight-year run as the face of Walker, Texas Ranger, a hit CBS show that showcased Norris’s titular cowboy downing countless crooks and criminals with hand strikes and roundhouse kicks.
The force of Norris’s blows—and the worshipfully slow-motion presentation that accompanied them—made Chuck an addictively watchable make-believe fighter for a seemingly forgotten moral code. It wasn’t a coincidence that he acquired several roles originally written for Clint Eastwood.
“I think Walker stands for what generally people would want him to stand for,” Norris once said of his signature character in an interview with ScreenSlam. “He’s very strong in his beliefs as a law enforcement officer, but yet at the same time there’s a soft side to him for people who are in need. If you’re a very vulnerable person, Walker’s a very compassionate person. But if you’re a bad guy, God forbid.”
When Chuck Norris goes swimming, sharks get out of the ocean.
Norris began his onscreen career as a villain, but his best roles allowed him to play a protector figure. Unbeknownst to many of his fans, while in the thick of his lucrative filmography, Chuck Norris—a symbol of American machismo—needed rescuing himself.
“My career started building,” he revealed in 2008 as the commencement speaker for Liberty University, “and unfortunately I got sucked into the entertainment world of Hollywood, and I wound up drifting from my faith. I had been in films and I had fame and fortune, but I was very unhappy and I couldn’t figure out why.”
For years, Norris forged his way into the homes and hearts of audiences seeking a certain kind of hero, using sheer brawn and ambition to make martial arts “American” and reinstate the simplicity of good versus evil. But “the harder I worked,” he explained, “the more famous I got, the bigger the hole in my heart became.”
All the while, his aging mother, Wilma, was busy praying for not only his success but also his salvation, as he wrote in 2021—including “for me to find a woman to change my life.”
This turned out to be Gena O’Kelley, his surviving second wife, who according to Norris rekindled old flames of faith by reading the Bible aloud to him: “It was like the Holy Spirit hit me,” he told Liberty grads. “He said, ‘Chuck, it’s time to come home.’ … I was hot for the Lord and I still am to this day.”
Norris’s faith informed his politics, leading him to make outspoken endorsements of Republican presidential candidates like Mike Huckabee and Mitt Romney. While in the 2000s and 2010s he loomed largest in relentless internet memes about his unmatched toughness, Norris’s quiet Christian walk led him to encounters with fellow believers both famous and ordinary.
Part of his testimony, according to Franklin Graham, was that he’d “dedicated his life to Christ as a young adult at one of my father Billy Graham’s crusades.” Greg Laurie, senior pastor of Harvest Christian Fellowship, recalled after meeting Norris that “the man behind the legend was always quick to point beyond himself. He never let the fame become the point.”
Jack Graham (no relation to Billy), senior pastor of Prestonwood Baptist Church in Texas, said he was Norris’s pastor during the actor’s time in Dallas shooting Walker, Texas Ranger. “Chuck was obviously a man’s man,” Graham wrote, “but he was also God’s man. … He was truly an icon in so many areas, and he leaves behind a lasting legacy as a faithful believer and an indelible mark as a cultural legend.”
When Chuck Norris makes a mistake, the mistake apologizes.
Besides a treasure trove of films, TV shows, and black belts, Norris also produced nine books and established Kickstart Kids, a martial arts nonprofit for youth. In addition to his wife, Gena, he is survived by five children, including a daughter he fathered with another woman whom he adopted after meeting her when she was 26 years old; and 13 grandchildren. He was previously married to Dianne Holechek.
Days before his passing, while celebrating his 86th birthday, Norris shared a video of himself—grayer but still swinging while doing kickboxing training. His caption was confident: “I don’t age. I level up.”
Cody Benjamin is senior news writer at Christianity Today.
