Church and State

With Catholics assuming prominent roles in Washington, and a new American Pope in place in the Vatican, a look at how Catholic thought is impacting the public debate.

Jerry Seib has been a journalist with The Wall Street Journal for almost 45 years. He served as the Journal’s Executive Washington Editor and wrote the weekly “Capital Journal” column for 29 years. He also reported from the Middle East for the Journal in the mid-1980s, covered the White House, has moderated three presidential debates, and interviewed every president since Ronald Reagan.

James V. Grimaldi is executive editor of the National Catholic Reporter, a 60-year-old award-winning nonprofit news organization independent of the Catholic Church and based in Kansas City, Mo. A multiple Pulitzer Prize winner and former investigative reporter for The Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post, Grimaldi is a native of Kansas City, Missouri, and a graduate of the University of Missouri Journalism School and Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. He has an honorary doctorate in humane letters from Creighton University and was named 2025 Distinguished Alumnus at the University of Missouri. His relationship with NCR began when he was a student at Kansas City’s Jesuit-run Rockhurst High School. Grimaldi, who has two grown sons, lives in Washington, D.C. with his wife, two dogs and three cats.

Ashley McGuire is a Senior Fellow with The Catholic Association. Her writing has appeared in The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, USA TODAY, TIME, Newsweek, First Things, RealClearPolitics, the New York Post, and The Huffington Post, among others, and she has appeared on CNN, Fox News, PBS, and most major television networks. In March of 2013, Ashley traveled to Rome to cover the papal conclave and provided live commentary for major news outlets like CNN International and the BBC. In April of 2014, she traveled to Geneva to testify at the United Nations in defense of the Holy See. She is a recipient of the Phillips Foundation Robert Novak Journalism Fellowship and the Susan B. Anthony List’s Young Pro-Life Leader award. She lives in the Washington, D.C. area, with her husband and five children.