A host of Christian pastors criticized U.S. Senate candidate Roy Moore and the conservative policies he supports on Saturday, and encouraged Alabama's religious leaders to sign onto a letter denouncing the Republican's "misguided candidacy."

"It is an extraordinary and almost unprecedented thing for pastors to take a public stand against a candidate for public office," said the Rev. Angie Wright, associate director of the Greater Birmingham Ministries and a retired United Church of Christ pastor. "But these are extraordinary times and requires all of us to take extraordinary measures."

The more than one-hour news conference at Tabernacle Baptist Church in Birmingham took aim at Moore's past record - which includes two removals as Alabama's chief justice, and the recent accusations that the former judge behaved inappropriately with teenage girls decades ago.

But speakers also blasted the current Republican agenda on health care, tax reform, and the minimum wage.

Most of the pastors who spoke also blasted Moore and his Christian network of supporters for engaging in what one pastor termed, "an extreme form of Republican religionism."

"It's not the gospel of Christ but the gospel of greed," said the Rev. William Barber II, president of Repairers of the Breach and co-chairman of "The Poor People's Campaign: A National Call for Moral Revival."

"It's the religion of racism and lies, and not the religion of love," said Barber, who oversaw the news conference. A former NAACP leader, Barber has been promoting the Poor People's campaign in the aftermath of the violent clashes that occurred in Charlottesville, Va., in August.

Press Conference With Alabama Faith & Moral Leaders Alabama faith and moral leaders held a press conference to call on Alabama Christians, clergy, and people of moral conscience to condemn Roy Moore’s immoral public policy agenda. Local leaders have asked the Rev. Dr. William J. Barber, II and the Rev. Dr. Liz Theoharis to join in this call. Posted by Repairers of the Breach on Saturday, November 18, 2017

A Moore campaign spokesman, in a statement to AL.com, said the gathering represented the "liberal fringe of the faith community."

"The liberal fringe of the faith community declared Judge Moore guilty decades ago during the Ten Commandments fight and then again during the battle for traditional marriage," said campaign spokesman Brett Doster, referencing the two past social crusades which led to Moore's removal as a state judge. "Their continued opposition is no surprise. The larger faith community across Alabama and the nation has flocked to vouch for Judge Moore's good name and will not allow a flaming liberal who supports partial-birth abortion to hijack the Senate seat over false allegations."

Moore faces Democrat Doug Jones in the Dec. 12 general election.

The news conference occurred two days after a host of pastors and pro-life advocates, also in Birmingham, spoke in praise of Moore and defended his character.

Moore has been accused of inappropriate behavior with teenage girls about 40 years ago, when he was in his 30s. The accusations first surfaced in a Washington Post piece published Nov. 9, and included claims from a woman who said she was 14 years old at the time Moore initiated a sexual encounter with her.

Moore also spoke at a Baptist church revival conference in Jackson on Tuesday, in which he said he wanted to talk about the issues and the direction of the country. Said Moore: "If we don't come back to God, we're not going anywhere."

But much of the theme during Saturday's news conference was about how Moore and his supporters were "distorting" Biblical scripture.

"Roy Moore is a Christian extremist," said Wright. "Any extremist of any religion can be dangerous."

"There is already too much economic Jim Crowe in Washington, and we do not want to export even more," said the Rev. Lawton Higgs Sr., a retired United Methodist Church pastor who founded the Church of the Reconciler in 1993 in downtown Birmingham to assist the homeless. He is also a self-described "recovering racist."

Higgs added, "The fundamentalist religion of the Republican agenda ... it has blocked my work and the work of all of these follks. They spent millions of dollars to keep the status quo in place and we must work together to change that."

The Rev. Kelley Hudlow, a deacon for an Episcopal Church in Birmingham, said she could "no longer stand quietly" while "the holy scripture is cherry-picked and perverted."

"It's time for the people of consciousness and faith in this great state to stop letting others to twist who we are and divide us," Hudlow said. "We love each other here and I've seen it time and time again during hurricanes and tornadoes and fires and death. We come together to lift each other up."

Wright and others, meanwhile, tried to distance Alabama from what they believe is an inaccurate national media portrayal of Alabama's Christian churches.

"If you lived outside the state, you might think that the extremist voice of Roy Moore represents Alabama," Wright said. "But we know better. You might think all Alabamians want to enshrine Christian supremacy and deny civil rights to people of color, different faiths and the LGBTQ community. But we know better."

"The evangelical word has been hijacked," said Barber. "You have so many people who continue to throw out policies ... they do not have a scripture background, yet they claim to be Christian, and they teach (others) that basically if you want to put up the Ten Commandments (as a monument), and hate gay people and dislike Muslims and support tax cuts and believe in guns, then you are a Christian. We are here to say that is not a Christian perspective."

He added, "True evangelicalism is not what you say, but what you do and how you challenge the systems of the world."

Other pastors utilized their speeches to encourage voter turnout next month. Attendees held up signs which read, "We're taking this battle to the ballot box" and chanted, at times, "Vote or die."

"I refuse to let Christianity to be hijacked and I encourage you to do the same," said the Rev. Dollie Howell Pankey, pastor of Saint James CME Church in Cordova. "I plan to go to the polls on Dec. 12. And I plan to cast my vote on my Christian values."