Joe Biden: America's second Catholic president

Joe Biden has been back in Washington for six days, and already he has attended Catholic Mass twice.

His first visit was to St Matthew's Cathedral in downtown Washington on the morning of his inauguration. Then, on the first Sunday of his presidency, he took in morning services at Holy Trinity Church, in the Georgetown neighbourhood of northwest DC.

The Jesuit-affiliated Holy Trinity is the same church to which John F Kennedy, the nation's first Catholic president, belonged. It's just a few blocks from Georgetown University, the nation's oldest Catholic college.

Public displays of religiosity are not uncommon among US presidents, but Biden appears poised to be the first president since Bill Clinton, who was a congregant at the Foundry Methodist Church, to regularly attend church services while in office.

George W Bush, a born-again Christian, did so infrequently - in part because of security concerns after the 11 September attacks. Barack Obama was similarly scarce, while Donald Trump preferred to spend his Sunday mornings at his private golf club in Virginia.

Jimmy Carter in the 1970s set the standard among modern presidents, as he was both a member and Sunday school teacher at First Baptist Church of DC. (The now 96-year-old ex-president continued to teach at a church in Plains, Georgia, until the coronavirus pandemic curtailed services last year.)