Amid growing tensions between President Trump and Pope Leo XIV, the pontiff met privately with Secretary of State Marco Rubio at the Vatican on Thursday morning
They discussed “the situation in the Middle East and topics of mutual interest in the Western Hemisphere,” according to a statement from Tommy Pigott, the spokesman for the State Department.
The meeting, in the pope’s private library at a palace that overlooks St. Peter’s Basilica, took place days after President Trump escalated his attacks on Leo, who has consistently criticized the U.S.-Israeli-led war in Iran. The pope, the first from the United States, has emerged as a spiritual counterweight to Mr. Trump’s leadership, encouraging American bishops to support immigrants amid a Trump administration crackdown and condemning the administration’s military ambitions in the Middle East.
President Trump told a conservative talk show host on Tuesday that Pope Leo was “endangering a lot of Catholics” and that “the pope would rather talk about the fact that it’s OK for Iran to have a nuclear weapon, and I don’t think that’s very good.”
Pope Leo, speaking later to reporters who had asked about the president’s latest remarks, said that “if someone wants to criticize me for proclaiming the Gospel, let him do so truthfully. The church for years has spoken against all nuclear weapons, so there’s no doubt there. And so I hope simply to be listened to for the value of the words of God.”
Mr. Rubio, speaking at the White House at a press briefing also on Tuesday, said that the president “doesn’t understand why anybody, leave aside the Pope” would “think that it’s a good idea for Iran to ever have a nuclear weapon.” The pope has never said that it would be a good idea for Iran to have a nuclear weapon.
On Thursday, Mr. Rubio was accompanied to the Vatican by his wife, Jeanette Dousdebes Rubio. The secretary then met one on one with the pope. A photo released by L’Osservatore Romano, a Vatican-owned newspaper, showed the secretary sitting to the side of the pope’s desk, apparently listening in concentration while the pope spoke.
In the State Department statement, Mr. Piggott said that “the meeting underscored the strong relationship between the United States and the Holy See and their shared commitment to promoting peace and human dignity.”
Mr. Rubio will stay in Rome through Friday, when he is scheduled to meet Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni and Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani of Italy.
Josephine de La Bruyère and Elisabetta Povoledo contributed reporting.
