Vance arrives at Vatican for meeting with pope's right-hand man

Local Italy

19-04-2025

Vance and his delegation arrived at the pope's official residence, the Apostolic Palace, just before 10am.
They were due to meet with the Vatican's secretary of state, Cardinal Pietro Parolin, and Paul Richard Gallagher, the Holy See's secretary for relations with foreign states.
The meeting comes just a day after Vance held talks with Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni.
Vance, who converted to Catholicism in his mid-30s, is also hoping to meet with Pope Francis, who's undergoing a two-month convalescence period following life-threatening pneumonia.
The US vice president, his wife and three children attended a Good Friday liturgy at Saint Peter's Basilica on Friday afternoon.
There has been no official confirmation that Vance plans to attend Easter Mass on Sunday.
Any meeting between Vance and Francis could be a tense affair.
In February, the pontiff wrote a letter to US bishops in which he condemned President Donald Trump's plan to deport migrants en masse, calling it a "major crisis".
Last year, Francis made another foray into US politics, calling harsh anti-migrant attitudes "madness" and criticising right-wing US Catholic figures for overly conservative stances.
Vance has a close relationship with the most conservative fringe of American churches, which have criticised the pope over his stances on migration, LGBTQ rights and social justice.
In May 2017, Trump was received at the Vatican for a half-hour meeting with Francis.