Newt Gingrich sat beneath the soaring dome in the largest Roman Catholic church in North America, the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington, and listened as a choir that included his wife sang at an evening vespers service for Pope Benedict XVI and 300 American bishops.

That is the moment, three years ago, that Mr. Gingrich says he decided to become a Roman Catholic, after having been born a Lutheran and joining the Southern Baptist Church in college. In 2009, Mr. Gingrich was baptized in the same Catholic parish church on Capitol Hill where Senator Robert F. Kennedy once attended noonday Mass and sometimes assisted the priest as an altar server.

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