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Last week, 12 Catholic bishops gathered around President Donald Trump as he sat behind the Resolute Desk in the Oval Office. They extended their hands toward the president as he bowed his head, his hands folded in prayer. Bishop James Golka of Denver, who led the prayer, placed his hand on the president’s shoulder.
“Thank you for the gift of our beautiful nation,” Bishop Golka said. “Thank you for the gift of our government. Thank you for the gift of this office and presidency. We lift up our president today. We ask your blessing upon him.”
The prayer was part of what the Catholic leaders believed to be a private meeting with the president to discuss immigration enforcement, religious freedom and education. But when the White House shared the video of the prayer on social media, the scene of the meeting’s arguably most sacred moment became a political flashpoint and was interpreted as a sign of political allegiance of the Catholic leaders with the administration.
The scene raised questions about the relationship between the Catholic Church and the administration less than two weeks before the midterm elections.
Some of the bishops have said they regret how the video was presented to the public.
“It really was not intended to be a political meeting per se,” said Bishop Scott Bullock of Rapid City, South Dakota, according to the National Catholic Reporter. He said the bishops were not advocating for any candidates, and praying with and for authorities is something the Bible instructs Christians to do.
Archbishop Jeffrey Grob offered an apology. Bishop William Joensen of Des Moines said in a statement that the prayer’s intention was not to endorse Trump but “that God would guide his heart and impel him to lead in a way consistent with the dignity of his office.”
“There are many things tied to this present administration that are blatantly at odds with our Catholic faith,” Bishop Joensen added.
The practice of praying with political leaders is not new or exclusive to one party. Before his 2009 inauguration, then-President-elect Barack Obama attended a private prayer service at St. John’s Episcopal Church in Washington. Florida megachurch pastor Joel Hunter invited those around Obama to place their hands on his shoulders as he offered a blessing. During Trump’s presidency, it has typically been evangelical leaders, many of whom have publicly sided with the president, who have participated in public prayers with him.
A recent Pew Research Center survey found that 50% of white Catholic voters favored the Republican candidate in their congressional district, while 32% favored the Democrat. Hispanic Catholic voters leaned in the opposite direction: 59% favored Democratic candidates and 19% Republicans.
Ultimately, prayer can be an act of humility — a plea invoking hope and wisdom for a political leader without conveying judgment or approval. But when a prayer is public, it’s impossible to separate it from its surroundings. When religious leaders pray with the president in the Oval Office, the image can communicate something they did not intend to say.
This internet moment also exposed the wounds of polarization. In a divided country, even something as apolitical and sacred in its nature as a prayer can become a proxy for political allegiance.
Religion and midterm elections
With this year’s midterm elections around the corner, most religious voters are either divided between two parties or leaning toward Democrats — except two religious groups, according to a Pew Research Center analysis.
Pew’s recent data found that President Donald Trump’s approval ratings among every religious group are near the lowest they’ve been since the start of the second term. Trump is also losing favor with groups that have traditionally viewed him positively.
“The 2026 midterm election is taking place amid deep public dissatisfaction with the state of the nation, near-record low approval ratings of President Donald Trump, and growing negativity about national economic conditions and the ongoing conflict with Iran,” reads a recent Pew report, which also put Trump’s approval rating at 30%.
Two religious groups are leaning toward Republican candidates. The majority of white evangelical Protestants (73%) would vote for a Republican candidate in the U.S. House of Representatives if Election Day were today. Only 12% would vote for a Democrat.
When it comes to the president’s job performance, white evangelicals are the only religious group in which the majority (58%) approve of the president’s job performance.
The second group favoring Republican candidates is white Catholic voters — 50% would also favor a Republican. But when it comes to Trump’s performance, they are less supportive. Among white Catholics, 39% approve of Trump, while 59% disapprove.
The split is narrower among white nonevangelical Protestant voters — 37% would vote for a Republican and 45% would choose a Democrat. The least supportive of Republican candidates are Black Protestant voters, with only 6% leaning toward a Republican candidate — even lower than support among atheists and agnostics. Hispanic Catholics also report low support for Republican candidates (with 19% for a Republican candidate and 59% for a Democrat).
When it comes to general political engagement in the midterms, Pew found that Democrats are more engaged and motivated in the upcoming election. And there is one issue that Americans of all political and religious convictions agree on: the economic state of the nation.
Fresh off the press
- A group of nine First Freedom Foundation fellows and religious liberty advocates from across the world spent time in Utah learning about faith communities and visiting places of worship.
- Opinion: JFK faced the Catholic question in 1960. Muslim candidates face it today.
- Is this really Joseph Smith? I watched 10 hours of research, and here’s what I think.
Faith in the media
- Over 1,000 poll chaplains will gather at voting locations in nine states expected to be the centers of contentious races, including Arizona, Ohio and North Carolina. — AP
- A Russian missile strike on the morning of Sunday, Oct. 18, destroyed the Good News Pentecostal Church in Kramatorsk in eastern Ukraine. Nobody was injured during the attack. The church ran a local bread ministry program for the poor and the elderly. — Evangelical Focus
- Montse Alvarado, the former president and COO of EWTN News, will become the first laywoman to lead a Vatican dicastery, taking charge of the Dicastery for Communication. Her role builds on reforms begun under Pope Francis that have expanded opportunities for laypeople to serve in senior Vatican leadership roles.
- A pastor at Cleveland’s LifeWorks congregation announced that her husband, whom she called a “prophet,” has taken a second wife, who is also a minister in the congregation. “It is amazing to know that this is the will of God and to live it,” Shakayla Talley, the pastor’s new wife, said from the pulpit.
- Conservative commentator Aaron Renn thinks more Protestant churches might embrace polygamy as what they see as the biblical way of marriage.
End note
What does it mean to preserve the memory of a people whose world and culture were nearly erased?
Gal Beckerman of The Atlantic traveled to Kyiv (my hometown) to track down the fragile archives of the Jewish writer and ethnographer known as S. An-sky.
In 1912, An-sky set out to capture “every aspect” of Jewish life — the customs, songs, folktales and religious traditions of Jewish communities across the Pale of Settlement, a territory in the western part of the Russian Empire where the government legally restricted most Jewish people to live between the late 18th century and the early 20th century. Much of the territory was later devastated by war and the Holocaust.
One of An-sky’s projects was a questionnaire containing more than 2,000 questions, which he used to interview people across the Pale of Settlement. One quote from the ethnographer’s writings struck me in particular. It conveys a desire to preserve the essence of a people, their imagination and values: “A nation lives not in suffering, but in the ecstasy of the realization of its ‘I,’ in joyful creation, in pride in its culture, in the poetry of its daily life. Only in that.”
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