Pope Francis Meets With JD Vance After Criticism of Trump Administration Right Before Pope’s Deαth and This is Not a Coincidence.

JD Vance was granted a brief audience with Pope Francis despite growing tensions between the Holy See and the Trump administration over migrants and welfare budget cuts.

The US vice-president, who converted to Catholicism in 2019, has been in Rome with his family since Friday and was said to be particularly keen to have a meeting with the Pope.

The Holy See had not committed to granting him an audience, but met with Mr Vance for “a few minutes” on Sunday morning, which was announced only when it was over.

The “brief” meeting happened shortly after 11.30am local time in Casa Santa Marta, the Vatican residence where the 88-year-old pontiff has lived since being elected in 2013.

The encounter offered a chance for them to exchange Easter greetings, the Vatican said.

There is bad blood between the Vatican and the Trump administration, particularly over issues such as migrants, refugees and drastic cuts to aid budgets.

In January, the Pope condemned the US government’s plans to embark on the mass rounding-up and deportation of illegal immigrants as “a disgrace”.

“This won’t do. This is not the way to solve things. That’s not how things are resolved,” he said on Italian television, just hours before Mr Trump was sworn in.

Mr Vance has cited medieval-era Catholic teaching to justify the administration’s policies but that in turn earned a rebuke from the Pope.

The pontiff rebutted the theological concept that the vice-president used to defend the policies, in an unusual open letter to Catholic bishops in the US.

The vice-president’s motorcade, which included glossy black vehicles with Department of Homeland Security number plates, entered Vatican City through a side gate and parked near Casa Santa Marta while Easter Mass was being celebrated in St Peter’s Square.

The Pope, who is recovering from a bout of double pneumonia delegated the celebration of the Mass to another cardinal.

But he made a brief appearance to bless the thousands of people who had gathered in St Peter’s Square, after the Mass ended, drawing cheers and applause from the crowds.

He appeared on the loggia balcony above the entrance to St Peter’s Basilica and waved to the crowd.

“Brothers and sisters, Happy Easter,” he said, sitting in a wheelchair and his voice sounding frail.

His traditional “Urbi et Orbi” (To the City and the World) address was read out by an aide.

In it, Pope Francis accused some countries of “stirring up contempt” towards migrants and the marginalised in remarks that may be interpreted as a veiled reference to the Trump administration’s deportation policies.

“How much contempt is stirred up at times towards the vulnerable, the marginalised, and migrants,” the papal address said.

Robert Mickens, a veteran Vatican analyst, said the remarks were not directed solely at the Trump administration but certainly encompassed the US government’s policies towards migrants, including mass deportations.

“It’s been a constant refrain of his pontificate, going right back to his visit to Lampedusa in 2013,” said Mr Mickens, referring to Pope Francis’s trip to the southern Italian island where many migrants and refugees land after crossing the Mediterranean from the coast of North Africa.

“That said, Trump obviously fits the bill. If the shoe fits… and it does fit in this case. This immoral Trump administration would be one of those governments that the Pope has in mind when he talks about there being contempt towards migrants,” he told The Telegraph.

‘Policies that humiliate people’

The Pope’s remarks came as a senior cardinal said that the Trump administration’s policies are “humiliating” migrants and refugees.

In an interview with the Italian newspaper La Stampa, Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi was asked how the world should engage with Trumpism.

“I think there should be two approaches. On the one hand, we need to be uncompromising in our judgment, especially when we see policies that humiliate people – such as migration policies – or undermine faith in institutions,” said the Italian cardinal, who is president emeritus of the Pontifical Council for Culture.

“At the same time, we must not isolate ourselves or give up on constructive dialogue. Jesus himself often found himself in bad company, with people whose ideas and values he did not share.”

On Saturday, Mr Vance met Cardinal Pietro Parolin, the Vatican’s secretary of state, before taking his wife and three children on a tour of some of Rome’s sights.

They ate ice cream, wandered through the city’s botanical garden and admired the view from the Janiculum, a ridge that overlooks the city, the Tiber and snow-capped mountains beyond.

Wearing jeans and a baseball cap Mr Vance wheeled his two young sons up to a viewpoint in a box-like cart on wheels. His eldest son was proudly wearing plastic Roman armour and wielding a plastic sword.