Dwight D. Eisenhower buried his family’s roots as Jehovah’s Witnesses and presented himself as a Presbyterian when he ran for president in the 1950. (He) was concerned Jehovah’s Witness injunctions against saluting the flag and armed military service would brand the candidate as anti-American…

On a recent Sunday, Rep. Michele Bachmann offered a Pentecostal church in Iowa an intimate account of her pilgrimage from apathetic teenager to devout Christian whose faith has persevered through hardship, including a miscarriage.

But when a reporter asked about the churches her family has attended, the Republican presidential candidate went mum.

“We’re not here to talk about anything other than just the church. Thank you,” Bachmann, told IowaPolitics.com, referring to Des Moines First Assembly of God, where she recited her spiritual testimony before 500 fellow Christians — and potential caucus voters — on July 17.

The Minnesota congresswoman’s eagerness to bare her soul but not the site of her Sunday worship seems to reflects a convergence of wider concerns: evangelicals’ increasing aversion to religious labels, a dread of being caught with “pastor problems,” and the cold political calculus of reaching the largest possible constituency.

“Today more evangelicals prefer a broader religious identity,” said D. Michael Lindsay, president of Gordon College in Wenham, Mass. “Not one that is tethered to a particular denominational hierarchy, but rather one that stresses a personal relationship with Jesus and an active, vibrant faith.”

Carrying the baggage of a Christian denomination — and more than a few have ecclesiastical skeletons in their closet — could also make it difficult to build political alliances across religious lines, added Lindsay, author of “Faith in the Halls of Power: How Evangelicals Joined the American Elite.”

But it is crucial that candidates like Bachmann, who has placed her faith at the center of her campaign, are questioned about how and where that faith was formed, said Diane Winston, an expert on religion and the media at the University of Southern California.