Biden to meet privately with Pope Francis on the sidelines of G7

President Joe Biden will meet privately with Pope Francis on Friday on the sidelines of the G7 summit in southern Italy, in what is expected to be a personally meaningful sit-down for the president who has spoken openly about the significance of his Catholic faith.

President Joe Biden will meet privately with Pope Francis on Friday on the sidelines of the G7 summit in southern Italy, in what is expected to be a personally meaningful sit-down for the president who has spoken frequently about the significance of his Catholic faith. A senior administration official said Friday that the two men were likely to discuss the war in Ukraine, the situation in the Middle East and climate change. The pope, who is making history this week by becoming the first pontiff to attend a G7 gathering, will also sit down with the group of world leaders to discuss, among other things, finding an ethical framework to underpin the development and use of AI, CNN previously reported. Deepfake images of the pope wearing a white puffer jacket went viral last year. The president is a lifelong practicing Catholic who met with the pope in 2021 in a visit to Italy. After that audience with the pope, Biden told reporters he discussed “a lot of personal things” with the pontiff and that the meeting was “wonderful.” Per CNN’s count, Friday will mark the fifth time Biden has met with this pope. The pope also visited the United States in the months following the president’s son Beau’s death in 2015 – and held a private meeting with Biden and his extended family in Pennsylvania. The pope, who is 87 years old, is also expected to meet separately with a number of other leaders in southern Italy, including Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.