The meeting between Bernie Sanders and Pope Francis at the Vatican won’t happen this weekend.
The Democratic presidential hopeful will be in Rome for less than 24 hours to address the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences ahead of Tuesday’s New York primary and had hoped to meet with Francis.
However on Friday, the Vatican ruled that out.
“There won’t be a meeting with the Holy Father,” Rev. Federico Lombardi, a Vatican spokesman, told The New York Times.
Sanders told the Italian daily La Repubblica that his visit to the Vatican did not mean the pope was backing his presidential candidacy.
“No. It is not that way. The Vatican is not involved in that. The conference is not a political event,” he said.
Last week, Lombardi echoed those comments, making it clear that Sanders had been invited “not by the pope but by the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences.”
