US Vice President Jd Vance met with high Vatican employees on Saturday (19) for conversations after Pope Francis’ strong criticism of the Trump administration’s immigration policy.
The Vatican said that during the meeting there was a “exchange of opinions” about migrants, refugees and prisoners.
The vice president, a Catholic, was in Rome with his family during Easter weekend and attended a Holy Friday service in the Basilica of St. Peter.
On Saturday morning (19), he met Cardinal Pietro Parolin, Secretary of State of the Holy See, and Archbishop Paul Gallagher, Foreign Minister of the Vatican. No meeting was confirmed with Pope Francis, who continues to recover from double pneumonia.
This Saturday’s meeting (19) marks the first face -to -face conversations between the Holy See and the second presidency of Trump and occurs amid tensions between the Catholic Church leaders and the Trump government.
“There was an exchange of opinions about the international situation, especially in relation to the countries affected by war, political tensions and difficult humanitarian situations, with special attention to migrants, refugees and prisoners,” according to a Vatican statement released after the meeting.
Prior to the conversations on Saturday (19), Parolin told the Italian newspaper La Repubblica that “the current US administration is very different from what we are used to and, especially in the West, than we have been entrusted for many years.”
Regarding pressure from the Trump government for a ceasefire in Ukraine, the cardinal said the Holy See “clearly supports sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine,” “it is up to the Ukrainians themselves to decide what they are willing to negotiate or, potentially, to give in to their perspective.”
Shortly before being hospitalized in mid-February, Francis issued a rebuke to the Trump administration’s immigration policy and refuted use by the vice-president of a theological concept, the “Ordo Amoris” (“Order of Love” or “Order of Charity”) to defend the administration approach.
“The true ‘ordo amoris’ that must be promoted is one that we find constantly meditating on the parable of the ‘good Samaritan’, that is, meditating on the love that builds a fraternity open to all without exception,” the Pope wrote in a letter to the Bishops of the United States.
The Vatican has also expressed concern about the cuts of Usaid taxes since January, while a US Bishop -born in El Salvador asked Catholics to resist deportations by Trump administration, who included arrests in El Salvador.
But after the Catholic bishops criticized Trump administration’s actions on immigration, Vance suggested that they were motivated by their “bottom line,” as the Catholic Church receives government money to help reset immigrants. The Episcopal Conference replied that federal funds do not cover their costs for this work.
The Vatican statement released after the meeting with Vance on Saturday said that during conversations “hope was expressed for serene collaboration between the state and the Catholic Church in the United States, whose valuable service to the most vulnerable people was recognized.”
Despite any tensions, the Vatican is accustomed to talking to leaders with whom he disagrees and the declaration observed “the good bilateral relations between the Holy See and the United States of America, and the common commitment to protect the right to religious and conscious freedom were reiterated.”
This content was originally published in Vance and Chancellor of the Vatican talk about immigration after criticism on the CNN Brazil website.
Source: CNN Brasil
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