Pete Buttigieg recently spoke on the “Spiritual Life” podcast hosted by Jesuit priest Father James Martin, where he spoke about coming out and parenting his adopted children. Buttigieg, and Episcopalian who served as Biden’s Transportation Secretary, discussed how his coming out brought him closer to God. “As a friend of mine put it when he was going through this process, there’s two things I’m really sure about: one is that God loves me, and another is that I’m gay,” he said.  “There are things you can just put … into perspective when you have put yourself in a position of being ready to accept God’s love and the unconditional nature and the infinite nature of God’s love that is taught in the best of the Christian tradition.”

Martin said he appreciated Buttigieg’s perspective. “It’s great to hear you say that. … I work with LGBTQ Catholics and there are still so many people (who consider) those two things inconsistent. So thank you for being a model of freedom for so many people,” he said. Buttigieg is married to a man and the two have adopted a pair of fraternal twins. The Catholic church officially condemns homosexuality and advises those with same-sex attraction to remain celibate.

Buttigieg shared his own faith perspective, saying he related more to Christ in the past. “I think at least most American liberal Christians, I think it’s safe to say, to the extent that we have affinity or identity in the Holy Trinity, it’s mostly the Son that we’re relating to, right? And that’s kind of, in a way, the point of the arrival of the incarnate figure of Jesus Christ [is] a little more relatable than the God the Father of the Old Testament.” Fatherhood, however, has brought him more in line with the Father, he said. “Maybe this is just the way the world, but now I’m in my 40s, and I’m a father, and I’m starting to better align, maybe, with the style that is presented, the style of love and the style of concern that we associate with God the Father,” he said. Martin affirmed the comment, saying, “That’s beautiful” and stating “it’s an entrée into the Trinity.”

Buttigieg’s recent appearance may be an attempt to normalize himself as a presidential contender in 2028. In a recent hypothetical poll, Buttigieg narrowly beat out former presidential candidate Kamala Harris 16% to 13% as the likely Democrat candidate in 2028. Like Gavin Newsom, who has begun painting himself is more center left, Buttigieg has begun to paint himself in a more moderate light, possibly to ingrate himself with Democrat voters who aren’t as enthusiastic with the Democrat party’s more extreme policies.