While Pope Francis’ historic visit to Washington next week will likely raise areas of disagreement with the Obama administration, the White House is downplaying these issues and is looking to play up the “moral authority” the pope brings in other areas like climate change and poverty.
The administration doesn’t want to “create any expectation that he is going to be a voice in U.S. domestic political issues,” said Ben Rhodes, an Obama deputy national security advisor, during a Thursday conference call previewing the Vatican leader’s visit. “Clearly, he operates on a different plane,” Rhodes said, explaining that the leader of the Roman Catholic Church focuses on global and spiritual issues.
Rhodes said he wouldn’t suggest that the papal visit is intended to affect domestic politics. “He will make his own determination” about what to tell Obama, Congress and America’s almost 70 million Catholics, Rhodes said. He and Obama are likely to have differences of opinions on issues such as abortion rights because “that’s the nature of this relationship,” Rhodes said.
But Obama “welcomes the pope’s voice and leadership” regardless, Rhodes said. And on many issues their priorities align, he said. For example, on June 18 the pope issued an encyclical on the environment in which he called for renewable fuel subsidies, decried the degradation of the planet from human-made pollution, lamented the loss of species and called on political leaders to fight climate change.
Francis was also very supportive and instrumental to the U.S. and Cuba beginning to normalize relations, Rhodes said. And the pope frequently speaks about poverty, income inequality and the moral obligation each person has to others to help those less fortunate, issues about which Obama cares deeply, Rhodes said.
No matter what Francis says, “he will make people think,” Rhodes said.
Disagreements are to be expected because “we are not perfect” as humans or as nations, Rhodes continued. Everywhere Francis has traveled so far, he “has found things to challenge,” and Rhodes doesn’t expect his visits to Washington, New York and Philadelphia to be any different.
But Rhodes predicted that the pope “will find many things to praise” about America and its leaders too.
On Tuesday, Francis lands at Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland, where Obama, First Lady Michelle Obama, Vice President Joe Biden and his wife Jill will greet him. On Wednesday the quartet, along with a crowd expected to number up to 15,000, will welcome him on the White House South Lawn for an arrival ceremony.
Obama and Francis, who met in Rome in March last year, will have a one-on-one meeting in the Oval Office on Wednesday. On Thursday, Francis will address a joint session of Congress.
