What did J.D. Vance write in his 2020 The Lamp essay about conversion and Mamaw?
Executive summary
J.D. Vance’s 2020 essay in The Lamp — variably titled “How I Joined the Resistance” and published as the Easter 2020 piece about “Mamaw and becoming Catholic” — portrays his conversion as a slow, intellectual and emotional journey anchored in the memory of his grandmother, “Mamaw,” whose uninstitutionalized faith both puzzled and inspired him [1] [2] [3]. In the essay Vance says he wrestled with whether converting to Catholicism would betray Mamaw’s Protestant sensibilities but ultimately came to see Catholicism as the best expression of the virtues he associated with her worldview [4] [3].
1. On Mamaw: a hinge between skepticism of institutions and deep personal faith
Vance describes Mamaw as “a woman of deep, but completely de‑institutionalized, faith,” someone who loved Jesus and preachers like Billy Graham but distrusted organized religion and rarely engaged in formal politics, a portrait he uses to explain his own spiritual restlessness and longing for rootedness [1] [5].
2. The conversion as a slow, uneven process, not a sudden epiphany
He repeatedly frames his entry into Catholicism as gradual — “slowly and unevenly” over years — rather than a single dramatic event, and notes that he was baptized and confirmed at age 35 at St. Gertrude’s in Cincinnati after this prolonged interior struggle [3].
3. Why Catholicism felt like Mamaw’s Christianity to him
Vance argues that, despite Mamaw’s unfamiliarity with liturgy, a foreign pope and apparently odd Catholic forms, he came to see Catholicism as “the closest expression of her kind of Christianity” because it emphasizes community, virtue formation, protection of family and the poor, and a demanding Christ who nevertheless forgives — qualities he attributes to his grandmother’s faith [3] [6].
4. The emotional obstacle: guilt about betraying Mamaw and working‑class identity
A key thread of the essay is his fear that converting might feel like a betrayal of Mamaw and of his Appalachian roots; Vance recounts wrestling with Protestant antipathy toward Catholic hierarchy and superstition, and with the question of whether joining the Church would estrange him from the working‑class identity he shares with Mamaw [4] [7].
5. Resolution and implications: community, virtue, and intellectual conversion
Vance concludes that Catholicism provided the social and moral framework he had been seeking — a community that forms virtue, asks for sacrifice, and orients affection — and presents his conversion as both an intellectual conversion (formed by reading and argument) and a practical choice to restore family priorities, temper, patience and forgiveness in his life [8] [3].
6. How others read the essay: praise, skepticism, and political framing
Commentators and religious outlets have used the Lamp essay to portray Vance as an “intellectual convert” drawn to Catholic social teaching and as someone who cast conversion as “joining the resistance,” while critics have questioned the sincerity or political utility of his conversion given his public profile; both endorsements and doubts about motivation are explicitly tied to how Vance framed the story in The Lamp [8] [9] [2].
7. What the essay does not claim (and reporting limits)
The published excerpts and synopses show Vance recounting family vignettes, intellectual influences and pastoral details, but the available reporting does not provide the full 6,777‑word text cited by several outlets for line‑by‑line verification here; assertions about exact phrasing beyond quoted summaries should be verified by consulting the original Lamp essay [5] [10].