When JD Vance printed his best-selling book “Hillbilly Elegy” in 2016, he had drifted away from the Christian faith of his childhood — a well-recognized story amid a broader nationwide retreat from organized faith that had left church pews emptier than in earlier many years.
Now, Vance as vp — and certain 2028 presidential contender — is a training Catholic, a conversion he has chronicled in his second book, “Communion,” publishing Tuesday. And it’s touchdown on bookshelves amid a exceptional turnaround: Catholicism is, by some measures, experiencing a resurgence within the United States in contrast to something in current reminiscence.
An American-born pope presides over the Vatican the primary time within the church’s historical past. While Catholicism nonetheless faces long-term demographic struggles, conversions are surging, with some dioceses reporting record highs. Accounts of Gen Z converts filling church pews have injected new power into the two,000-year-old faith and have stunned even Catholic leaders who had lengthy braced for continued decline.
The revival has discovered explicit resonance on the political proper. Former Trump adviser Steve Bannon; right-wing influencer Jack Posobiec; anti-diversity, fairness and inclusion activist Christopher Rufo; and podcasters Michael Knowles and Matthew Walsh are among the many outstanding conservatives who’ve embraced their Catholic faith — a faction of the new proper constructing a political and religious identification distinct from the evangelical Protestantism that has lengthy dominated Republican politics.
“Communion,” a replica of which was obtained by NCS, is Vance’s entry into that rising canon. In it, Vance connects his faith to his political transformation — from Donald Trump skeptic to Trump’s vp — and to his views on the prevailing social and financial debates. Through this lens, Vance argues for prioritizing households over gross home product, limiting migration, rejecting common primary revenue, and discouraging abortions by enhancing circumstances for new moms and younger kids.
“My political evolution was downstream of the much more fundamental change in how I saw the world,” he writes. “I had looked inside our elite institutions and found them intellectually and spiritually broken. Was it any surprise that I would eventually reject their politics as well?”
Kevin Roberts, president of the Heritage Foundation — the influential conservative suppose tank behind a lot of Trump’s second-term agenda — stated having probably the most highly effective elected Catholic within the nation communicate brazenly about his faith ought to embolden extra officers to do the identical.
“We live in a time that for some Americans, it’s not only unfashionable but unacceptable that many of us talk about faith in public,” stated Roberts, himself a Catholic. “It’s rather remarkable because so many leaders are uncomfortable doing that for whatever reason. It’s a very positive move, not just for him and the conservative movement but for the country because what people are looking for is transparency and authenticity from their leaders.”
The book additionally arrives as questions on Vance’s political future are more and more tough to disregard. Sitting vice presidents nearly by no means publish books whereas in workplace — and the final one who did, George H.W. Bush, went on run for president, famous Joel Goldstein, a constitutional regulation professor at Saint Louis University and one of many nation’s foremost consultants on the vice presidency.
But Vance faces an uncommon bind: He should serve loyally as Trump’s No. 2 whereas establishing himself as the way forward for the occasion on a compressed timeline. Trump is constitutionally barred from a 3rd time period however has proven little curiosity in anointing a successor — and has at occasions privately floated Secretary of State Marco Rubio instead.
A book about faith, Goldstein argued, permits Vance to step out from Trump’s shadow with out risking divisions with the person he nonetheless serves.
“To the extent one of the challenges of running for president is being perceived as a No. 1 when you have been acting as a No 2, this gives him a stage where he’s seemingly independent,” he stated.
Those near Vance deny the book is supposed to stir extra hypothesis about his presidential ambitions. One ally of the vp’s advised NCS that Vance cleared the book by White House management earlier than transferring ahead and that the reception from Trump’s internal circle was constructive. Neither the White House nor Vance’s workplace responded to requests for remark.
Vance has downplayed the timing, too, saying he started working on the book not lengthy after he completed his first memoir. A 2024 monetary disclosure type from his time within the Senate reveals Vance had a take care of HarperCollins to jot down a second book in 2017 (his workplace didn’t say why earlier disclosures didn’t be aware this settlement). In 2020, he published 6,700 words in The Lamp, a Catholic journal, on his transformation from lapsed Christian to atheist to his baptism. He has additionally credited the late conservative activist Charlie Kirk for uplifting him to talk out extra about his faith.
While “Communion” appears forward to life after demise, there’s little hint of the near-term choice looming over Vance within the textual content’s 288 pages. Nor is there a lot account of his expertise as vp, working inside Trump’s White House.
Rather, in explaining the aim of the book, Vance writes: “I’m a Christian, and I became a Christian because I believe that Jesus Christ’s teachings are true. But I didn’t always think that, and by sharing my journey I might be helpful to others—Catholic, protestant, or otherwise—who are seeking reconciliation with God.”
A publicity blitz to help the book is already underway, with stops on Fox News, “CBS Sunday Morning” and “The View,” a daily testing floor for White House hopefuls. The book may even promote in shops alongside printed works from aspiring Democratic politicians similar to California Gov. Gavin Newsom, New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker and former Vice President Kamala Harris.
Vance additionally has competitors in his selection of matter. Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro has spoken often about his Jewish faith whereas selling his personal book. Another entry, from Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear — additionally a Democrat and potential 2028 contender — is predicted later this 12 months. Like Vance, his book, “Go and Do Likewise: How We Heal a Broken Country,” will middle on his Christian beliefs.
Terry Schilling, the founding father of American Principles Project, a socially conservative advocacy group that has urged Republican leaders to lean into tradition wars, is already enthusiastic concerning the prospect of Vance succeeding Trump. Schilling, additionally a Catholic, stated he anticipates Vance’s new book will permit him to put out the commonalities between himself and evangelical Republicans, who stay an influential voting bloc in GOP politics.
It’s a a lot completely different strategy from the one famously taken by John F. Kennedy when he confronted questions on his Catholic faith throughout his 1960 presidential marketing campaign. Kennedy declared in an handle to Protestant ministers that “the separation of church and state is absolute” and that his choices as president wouldn’t be influenced by the church. The second Catholic president, Joe Biden, was extra open about his faith however navigated different tensions with his faith, particularly over his views on abortion.
“Rather than doing the JFK thing and saying, ‘I’m not going to be a Catholic president,’ he’s saying, ‘If I’m elected president, here is how my Catholic faith will inform my presidency,’” Schilling stated.
Polling reveals that Catholics are transferring within the route of those that establish as evangelicals by changing into extra conservative. Trump received 59% of Catholics in 2024, in response to NCS exit polls, greater than any Republican presidential nominee since no less than 1972. New converts and lately ordained monks and nuns additionally seem like significantly extra conservative than these born into the faith and older clergy, stated Ryan Burge, a political scientist on the Washington University Center on Religion and Politics.
“It’s an institution that’s becoming increasingly conservative, increasingly Republican, and Vance embodies where the church is headed,” Burge stated.
This new wave of conservative Catholics has grown more and more skeptical of the political actions by the Vatican, first below Pope Francis and now Pope Leo XIV. There has been friction at times, too, between Trump’s White House and the Catholic leaders, notably over immigration. Trump has referred to Pope Leo as “weak on crime” and “terrible on foreign policy,” sparking the pontiff to reply that he had “no fear of the Trump administration.”
Amid the back-and-forth, Vance suggested the Vatican to “stick to matters of morality.”
In 2025, Vance also drew scrutiny from some church leaders when he cited a medieval Catholic theology often known as “ordo amoris” in justifying Trump’s immigration crackdown. Vance defined the doctrine as: “You love your family, and then you love your neighbor, and then you love your community, and then you love your fellow citizens in your own country. And then after that, you can focus and prioritize the rest of the world.” Pope Francis later pushed again in opposition to Vance’s interpretation in a letter to US bishops.
More lately, Vance responded positively to Pope Leo’s warnings concerning the risk of artificial intelligence to humanity.
The pressure between Washington and the Vatican underscores the rising consciousness across the Catholic Church’s significance in American politics. Kelsey Reinhardt, the president of Catholic Votes, a corporation that mobilizes voters of the faith, stated her group’s political arm is already planning easy methods to wield the faith’s rising affect in 2028, when there might be a slate of Catholic presidential contenders.
In addition to Vance, Rubio is also Catholic, and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis was raised within the faith as effectively. On the Democratic facet, Newsom and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio Cortez establish as Catholic, and so does Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., whose political ambitions stay an open secret.
“If Catholics aren’t at the table, they’re on the menu,” Reinhardt stated. “People are waking up to the realization that the Catholic vote is determinative of this nation.”
But the renewed curiosity in Catholicism masks broader tendencies that present the faith is dropping floor in America, Burge stated. The uptick in converts, he famous, is greater than current years however nonetheless traditionally low and only a small fraction of Americans, about 1.5%. Meanwhile, the Catholic Church is baptizing about 500,000 infants a 12 months — down from 1.3 million within the Sixties — and way more individuals are leaving than becoming a member of, Burge stated.
The actuality, Burge stated, is that Vance’s book — and his political future — are confronting a faith nonetheless in decline.
“Catholicism is having a moment. There’s no way to deny that,” Burge stated. “The vibes are up. But the macro level trends are down.”