Joe Biden attends first Sunday Mass as President

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Biden is the second Catholic president in US history, and weekly Mass is expected to be a fixed part of his schedule. That’s a level of devotion to regular religious services not seen from recent presidents, who were professed Christians but intermittently attended church or worshipped privately while in office.
Biden's Catholic faith will be on full display as the first publicly churchgoing president in decades

And while it’s unclear whether he will adopt a permanent parish in Washington during his term, Biden’s churchgoing will provide a window into how his spiritual side aligns with his politics.

Biden was inside Holy Trinity for at least 35 minutes and his grandchildren, Maisy and Finnegan, and his son, Hunter, accompanied the President to Sunday’s service. Asked how the service was, he replied, “lovely.”

Catholicism has been an integral part of Biden’s life, who has been a regular at Mass since childhood and attended Catholic schools. He married his late first wife, Neilia, in a Catholic church and peppers his political speech with quotes from Scripture, Catholic hymns and references to the nuns and priests he learned from in school.

He frequented Holy Trinity during his time as vice president to former President Barack Obama. The church — the oldest Catholic church in Washington, according to Holy Trinity — was also regularly attended by the first US Catholic president, John F. Kennedy.

The morning of his inauguration, Biden attended a service at the Cathedral of St. Matthew the Apostle in Washington, DC, with all four congressional leaders.

CNN’s Allie Malloy, Michael Warren and Jason Hoffman contributed to this report.

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