US Vice President JD Vance said he hopes his wife, Usha, who is Hindu, will one day become a Christian like him. However, he added that it’s fine if she doesn’t, as everyone has free will.
Speaking candidly about faith and family on Wednesday, Vance said, “I’ll say now in front of 10,000 of my closest friends, do I hope eventually that she is somehow moved by the same thing that I was moved by Church”?
He continued, “Yeah, I honestly do wish that, because I believe in the Christian gospel, and I hope eventually my wife comes to see it the same way, but if she doesn’t, then God says everybody has free will, and so that doesn’t cause a problem for me.”
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Vance made the remarks while speaking at a Turning Point movement rally in Oxford, Mississippi, after a woman of Indian origin asked him about his family’s interfaith dynamics.
Turning Point, founded by conservative Christian activist Charles Kirk, who was assassinated last month, served as the backdrop for the discussion.
Vance noted that navigating religious differences is important not only in interfaith marriages but also in unions between different Christian denominations or between believers and atheists.
“The way that we’ve come to our arrangement is that she’s my best friend. We talked to each other about this stuff. So, we decided to raise our kids Christian,” he said, IANS reported.
He added, “The only advice I can give is you just got to talk to the person that God has put you with, and you’ve got to make those decisions as a family unit”.
JD Vance Recalls His Meeting With Wife
Vance further added that when he met Usha at Yale University, he was an “agnostic or atheist.”
His wife, he said, “that’s what I think she would have considered herself as well.”
Reacting to his wife’s origin, he said, “She grew up in a Hindu family, but not a particularly religious family in either direction.”
Vance gradually found his way back to Christianity, returning to the Protestant faith he was raised in. However, three years ago, he took a different path from the denominations dominant in Donald Trump’s circle, converting to Catholicism, a faith he now follows devoutly.
Vance clarifies Amid Row Over ‘wife’s conversion’ Remark
In a post on X, Vance clarified his remarks from the event where he had expressed hope that his wife, a Hindu, might one day embrace Christianity. He stated that his wife has no plans to convert, explaining, “Like many people in an interfaith marriage—or any interfaith relationship—I simply hope she may one day see things the way I do.”
“Regardless, I’ll continue to love and support her and talk to her about faith and life and everything else, because she’s my wife,” he added.
