High Profile Politicians Converting To Catholicism

Former House Speaker and possible 2012 Presidential candidate, Newt Gingrich is providing few details about his recent decision to convert to Roman Catholicism.

Newt GingrichGingrich previously had identified as a Baptist, but two Saturdays ago in Washington, DC, the former House Speaker was officially confirmed into the Catholic Church.

Gingrich, whose third wife Calista is a Catholic, recently criticized the University of Notre Dame for inviting President Obama to speak at its commencement, saying Obama’s “policies are so anti-Catholic values.” In an interview with OneNewsNow, Gingrich was reluctant to explain why he “swam the Tiber.”

“I haven’t talked about this much in public, and I’m not going to for at least six months or a year, but I will say that I found myself deeply comforted, and a deep sense of belonging and of finding a peace in my soul in a way that I just found very, very powerful,” he explains.

Other high-profile Catholic converts from the political realm include Sam Brownback, Bobby Jindal, Jeb Bush, and former British Prime Minister Tony Blair.

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New World Order – Tony Blair Set To Become First President of EU

Recent convert to Catholicism, Tony Blair has emerged as the leading candidate to become the first permanent president of the European Union after Gordon Brown gave his grudging blessing to the plan. The former prime minister has stepped up his campaign for the job, which he wants to use to build a bridge between Europe and the new Obama administration.

His return to the global stage would be a shock to his critics over the Iraq war and dismay many in Europe.

But The Independent on Sunday has learnt that Mr Brown has accepted that his old rival should be in pole position for the appointment, on the basis that Britain needs to have a key figure in the architecture of the “new world order”.

A senior British official said: “He [Brown] will have to swallow hard to sit down in meetings once again with Blair. But he accepts that there needs to be someone from the UK in the new global architecture. There is no opposition to the plan. Things have moved on, people have moved on.”
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Blair a Secret Catholic At No10

Tony Blair was a secret Catholic throughout his years in office, according to one of his former advisers.

Lance Price, who was a Downing Street spokesman, recalled that, a year after being elected, Mr Blair asked him to ‘’squash” a report that he had told the Archbishop of Siena ”in my heart I feel more of a Catholic”.

Mr Price told the Today program on BBC Radio 4 that Mr Blair had told him, ”I don’t discuss my Catholicism with anybody.” He went on, ”I thought what he meant to say was, ‘I don’t discuss my Christianity with anybody.’ But looking back, I think, in his heart he was a Roman Catholic throughout the time that he was prime minister.” Mr Price was commenting on a program to be shown on BBC1 yesterday in which the former prime minister appears to express regret that he was not more open about his religion while at No10. In an interview for Christmas Voices, Mr Blair says, ”It would have caused such a palaver if I had done it while I was still in office.” But he admits most people would not have minded. ”Probably we could have been a little more adventurous on this without bringing the house down.”

Mr Blair, whose wife is a Catholic and whose children have been brought up in the faith, was received into the Church last December. Independent

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