Biden to carry a personal assembly with Pope Francis on sidelines of G7 summit

BARI, Italy — President Joe Biden is predicted to satisfy with Pope Francis privately Friday on the sidelines of the G7 summit in Italy, in accordance with a senior administration official.

The pontiff will change into the primary pope to attend G7 discussions and is selecting to focus his consideration on synthetic intelligence, each its technological benefits and potential risks.

The assembly between Biden, who attends Mass weekly, and the chief of the Catholic church comes days after a jury discovered the president’s son Hunter Biden responsible of gun crimes associated to his drug habit. Biden, who incessantly talks concerning the significance of his household and the lack of two of his kids and his first spouse, has pointed to his religion as having guided him by means of troublesome occasions.

Biden final met with Pope Francis on the Vatican in October 2021, when the president praised him as “essentially the most important warrior for peace I’ve ever met.”

The 2 have exchanged written messages since then, the official stated.

Throughout his interview with particular counsel Robert Hur final yr, Biden stated he was nonetheless in contact with the pontiff throughout a dialogue on some folders that included one labeled “Papal Visits.”

“I nonetheless talk with the pope, you realize what I imply. However is it fixed? No. Anyway,” he stated, in accordance with the transcript launched by the White Home.

Later, throughout some crosstalk, Biden joked: “He’s my ticket.” Because the group laughed, he replied: “That was a joke.”

In Puglia, the pope is predicted to have one-on-one conferences with Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelenskyy, France’s Emmanuel Macron, India’s Narendra Modi, Brazil’s Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, Canada’s Justin Trudeau, Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, Kenya’s William Ruto and Algeria’s Abdelmadjid Tebboune, in accordance with the Vatican.

Whereas Francis, 87, has stated he intends to serve in his position for so long as his well being will enable, there was some hypothesis a couple of potential transition plan for the longer term. One doable successor is Cardinal Matteo Zuppi, the archbishop of Bologna. Biden met with him within the Oval Workplace final summer season, the place they mentioned, amongst different issues, the Vatican’s advocacy for the protected return of forcibly deported Ukrainian kids.

Biden has identified the pope since 2013, when then-President Barack Obama tapped the nation’s first Catholic vp to guide the American delegation to Rome for Francis’ inauguration.

The president later recalled that in his first transient assembly with the newly put in pontiff, Francis embraced him and stated, “You’re at all times welcome right here.”

In 2015, three months after Biden’s eldest son, Beau, died of mind most cancers, the pope held a personal viewers with the president and his household earlier than wrapping up a multiday go to to Philadelphia.

This text was initially printed on NBCNews.com

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