STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
One of the last people to see Pope Francis before his death was Vice President Vance. He visited Francis in Rome on Sunday. The vice president met briefly on that day with the pope. In recent months, they had a very public disagreement, an exchange of views, as people used to say.
So let's talk this through with NPR White House correspondent Deepa Shivaram. Good morning.
DEEPA SHIVARAM, BYLINE: Hey. Good morning.
INSKEEP: What has the vice president said today?
SHIVARAM: So the VP posted on X this morning, saying that his heart goes out to the millions of Christians all over the world who loved Pope Francis. And he mentioned how happy he was to meet with Pope Francis just yesterday, like you mentioned, Steve, even though the pope was very ill. And the VP had been in Rome just the past few days with his wife, Second Lady Usha Vance, and their three young kids.
In addition to meeting with officials, like Italian prime minister Giorgia Meloni, while he was there, he met with Vatican officials and, of course, with the pope, and the family attended Easter Mass at the Vatican.
INSKEEP: Well, amazing trip for the kids. I just think about that for a moment.
SHIVARAM: Yeah.
INSKEEP: But what was their public disagreement, the vice president and the pope?
SHIVARAM: Yeah. This kind of started happening at the end of January in this year. JD Vance went on Fox News and used a really old theological concept in Catholicism that translates to order of love or order of charity. And he said the idea is that people should first care for their family and their community. And here's where it gets kind of controversial. He said, people in their own country before helping the rest of the world. And he later posted on social media and essentially said that that kind of hierarchy is common sense.
But then the pope appeared to refute that interpretation. About two weeks later, the pope wrote a letter to U.S. Catholic bishops, taking issue with President Trump's immigration and deportation actions. He said that Trump's pledge for mass deportations was, quote, a "major crisis."
And here's where he seemed to respond to Vance. He wrote, quote, "Christian love is not a concentric expansion of interests that little by little extend to other persons and groups." And he said it was important for these Catholic bishops in the U.S. to disagree with any measure that identifies the illegal status of someone who's a migrant with criminality. And he was generally very critical of this policy of deporting people who, the pope says, come from countries, you know, with poverty and exploitation and things like that.
INSKEEP: A really interesting reminder that while we have separation of church and state in this country, people of faith have opinions.
SHIVARAM: Yes.
INSKEEP: And there's a difference of opinion here. How has the vice president responded to that?
SHIVARAM: So I will say in the context of all this, it's important to point out here that Vance himself is a Catholic. He converted to Catholicism about seven years ago. And he acknowledged criticism from the pope, but he said he wasn't going to litigate about who was right and wrong in remarks that he made at the end of February in Washington.
INSKEEP: Deepa, thanks so much. Really appreciate it.
SHIVARAM: Thank you.
INSKEEP: That's NPR White House correspondent Deepa Shivaram, speaking about Vice President Vance, who saw Pope Francis yesterday just hours before the pontiff's death. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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