Switching things up: The politics of religious converts
by Rolando Ortega (class of 2026)
When it comes to politics, our religious beliefs can be quite important. More religious individuals lean Republican, while those who do not belong to a religion overwhelmingly support Democrats. Even among those who are religious, we see key partisan differences, such as Evangelicals voting overwhelmingly for the Republican Party while other groups, such as Jewish people, vote for Democrats.
However, one peculiar group that is not commonly discussed when it comes to religion and politics is religious converts: individuals who currently have a different religious identity from the one they were raised with. Millions of Americans fall within this group, with approximately 35% of U.S. adults identifying with a religious group different from the one in which they were raised. Even Vice President JD Vance was raised as a Protestant but now identifies as a member of the Catholic church.
Do religious converts have unique political views when compared to those who have maintained a consistent religious identity during their lifetime? To investigate these questions, I turned to the Pew Research Center’s Religious Landscape Study (RLS). The RLS is the largest study conducted by Pew, asking more than 30,000 respondents questions about religious identities, beliefs, and perspectives on certain political issues, collecting data on each respondent’s current religious identity versus the one they were raised with.
For this investigation, I took a closer look at converts and non-converts among Protestants and Catholics, who are the two largest religious groups respondents identified with. Within these groups, 17% of Protestants and 9% of Catholics are converts. Among Protestants, there was little difference in the party affiliations of those who were raised Protestant versus those who converted to Protestantism. 58% of Protestant non-converts identified as Republicans and 36% identified as Democrats; meanwhile, converts split 59% Republican to 33% Democrat.
In comparison, significant differences occur among Catholics. Those who converted to Catholicism leaned much more Republican: 59% identified as Republicans while only 33% were Democrats. Meanwhile, non-converts were more evenly split between Republicans and Democrats, 48% to 44%, respectively. This is consistent with data that shows that American Catholics have historically been evenly split politically. Clearly, among his fellow Catholic converts, the vice president is not alone in identifying with the Republican Party, more so than their fellow Catholics who are not converts.
This dynamic, especially among Catholics, is not just present in political affiliation but in their beliefs on social and political issues as well. For example, while Protestant converts and non-converts have little difference in their beliefs on whether homosexuality should be accepted in society– approximately 47% in each group say it should not– Catholic converts are less likely to be accepting of homosexuality than their non-convert counterparts, 65% versus 75%.
Meanwhile, both Protestant and Catholic converts had more restrictive views on abortion than other members of their religions. Protestant converts were three points, 52% to 49%, more likely to hold these views, while the share among Catholics increased by five points, from 39% to 44%, between non-converts and converts, differences that are statistically significant. As one can observe, converts have a higher tendency to hold more traditional views on social issues, particularly Catholic converts.
When asked how large the government should be, 46% of Protestant non-converted supported a bigger government that provided more services compared to 50% of converts. However, whereas 55% of Catholic non-converts supported a bigger government, converts were much more supportive of a smaller government, 53% to 44%. While Protestant converts were slightly more likely to support a bigger government than non-converts, the differences among Catholic converts and non-converts were more drastic, with the former being more supportive of smaller government.
A similar result appears when respondents are asked whether they support making the U.S. a Christian nation. Little difference between Protestant converts and non-converts emerged, but Catholic converts were 61% in favor of such an idea compared to only 53% of non-converts. Thus, while Protestants hold similar views regardless of conversion, Catholic converts, significantly more than non-converts, see government less as an institution that provides services and more as a vehicle for promoting their religion in broader society.
Even in terms of religious beliefs and practices, differences emerge between non-converts and converts among both Catholics and Protestants. Protestant converts are about as likely to say they attend church at least once a week as non-converts, whereas Catholic converts are ten points more likely than their non-convert counterparts, 38% to 28%, to say that they go to church at least once a week. Similarly, 80% of Catholic converts say that the Bible has some level of importance in their life, five points higher than Catholic non-converts; among Protestants, the two groups show little difference in how important the Bible is in their lives. Clearly, it’s not just political and social issues where more differences emerge between convert and non-convert Catholics than among Protestants– views and behaviors concerning one’s religion itself see similar trends, too.
Why, then, do Catholic converts lean more Republican and have more conservative, traditional views on religion and politics compared to their fellow Catholics, even though the same may not be said about Protestants? A potential explanation is that Catholicism, in the eyes of today’s converts, uniquely aligns with their political and cultural beliefs. Many of these individuals, including Vice President Vance and other young converts like him, see the Catholic church as a long-standing institution that upholds the traditional values about family and society they adhere to, especially in a world they deem as increasingly against these stances.
Thus, converts’ views on social issues, especially those that are often entangled with religious beliefs like homosexuality and abortion, along with their religious practices and sentiments, are more firmly in line with traditional Catholic teachings. Their more conservative positions are also reflected in their views on politics and the role of government in society, aligning with the rest of their broader worldview but diverging from the more moderate or liberal beliefs of non-convert Catholics, most notably Pope Francis himself.
While those switching religions– especially among Christian religions– are discussed less compared to other groups, studying their religious and political behavior may reveal important trends that have the potential to influence debates surrounding political and religious issues. It can inform us about the actions and perspectives of both prominent individuals and emerging groups of Americans who have sway over policy and perceptions of religion, shed light on distinct groups within religious communities, and help us understand changes in religion’s influence on some of today’s most important debates.
