VATICAN CITY, May 7 - U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio is due to meet Pope Leo at the Vatican on Thursday in what Vatican officials and U.S. diplomats have described as a potentially sensitive engagement amid an ongoing public spat between the pope and President Donald Trump.
Rubio, who also serves as the president's national security adviser, was scheduled to arrive at the Apostolic Palace at about 11:15 a.m. (0915 GMT) for the visit. The two are expected to hold a closed-door conversation lasting roughly a half-hour, after which Rubio will meet with the Vatican's top diplomat, Italian Cardinal Pietro Parolin.
The encounter will be the first meeting between Pope Leo and a Trump cabinet official in nearly a year. It follows a period of heightened public rhetoric from the president aimed at the pope, and comes as both Vatican and U.S. officials prepare for frank exchanges.
Context and recent tensions
Pope Leo - described in Vatican briefings as the first U.S. pope - has in recent weeks taken a more outspoken posture on the international stage, criticizing the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran and voicing opposition to aspects of the Trump administration's immigration policies. Those positions have drawn the president's ire and a series of unusually sharp public attacks.
On Monday, President Trump asserted that the pope believed it was acceptable for Iran to obtain nuclear weapons and said Leo was "endangering a lot of Catholics" by opposing the war. Those remarks prompted a public response from the pope, who told journalists after the attack that he was repeating the Christian message of peace and firmly rejected the suggestion that he supported nuclear weapons.
"The mission of the Church is to preach the Gospel, to preach peace," the pope said. "The Church has spoken out for years against all nuclear arms, on that there is \u2060no doubt." The Vatican has emphasized the Church's long-standing teaching that nuclear weapons are immoral.
Diplomatic posture and the Vatican calendar
Leo, who will mark his first anniversary leading the 1.4-billion-member Church on Friday, has broadened his public interventions in recent weeks. During a four-nation African tour last month, the pope criticized the direction of global leadership and said the world was "being ravaged by a handful of tyrants," comments he later said were not directed specifically at President Trump.
Rubio and Vice President JD Vance are both Catholics and both met Pope Leo a year ago after attending the pope's inaugural mass. Ahead of Thursday's meeting, Rubio told reporters at a White House briefing on Tuesday that he expected to raise issues including Cuba and concerns about religious freedom worldwide. The secretary of state traveled to Rome without members of the press on his plane, an arrangement described as unusual for a U.S. secretary of state.
Brian Burch, the U.S. ambassador to the Holy See, told journalists earlier on Tuesday that the conversation between the pope and the cabinet official was likely to be "frank." Rubio is undertaking a two-day visit to Rome and is scheduled to meet Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni on Friday. Meloni has publicly defended the pope from President Trump's attacks, and her defence minister has warned that the war in Iran poses risks to U.S. leadership.
What to watch
- The content and tone of the closed-door meeting between Rubio and Pope Leo, and any subsequent readouts from either side.
- Rubio's discussion with Cardinal Pietro Parolin, which may shed light on Vatican diplomatic priorities and bilateral concerns such as religious freedom and Cuba.
- Follow-up meetings in Rome, including Rubio's planned conversation with Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, and any public statements from European officials responding to tensions between the U.S. president and the pope.