“We congratulate Mr. Biden and acknowledge that he joins the late President John F. Kennedy as the second United States president to profess the Catholic faith,” Archbishop José Gomez of Los Angeles, president of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops, said in a November 7 statement. “May she [the Blessed Virgin Mary] help us to work together to fulfill the beautiful vision of America’s missionaries and founders — one nation under God, where the sanctity of every human life is defended and freedom of conscience and religion are guaranteed.”