When a Pope Meets a U.S. President: 2014

Note: This post is an update of an earlier piece we wrote in anticipation of President Obama's July 10, 2009 meeting with Pope Benedict XVI.

President Obama's upcoming meeting with Pope Francis at the Vatican, March 27, marks the 28th time  a sitting U.S. President has met with a pope. The meetings, which will now include 12 presidents and 6 popes, are replete with historical odds and ends:

1. Woodrow Wilson met Benedict XV, the Vatican, January 4, 1919. Meeting just after the end of World War I, Wilson had pushed for a lasting peace via his League of Nations proposal, and Pope Benedict had been a powerful advocate for peace throughout the war.

2. Dwight D. Eisenhower met John XXIII, the Vatican, December 6, 1959. Following a 40-year hiatus, this meeting would begin in earnest the precedent of every pope (except John Paul I) and every president meeting. While apparently very genial, this meeting also faced the challenge of Eisenhower not knowing Italian and John XXIII not knowing English.

3. John F. Kennedy met Paul VI, the Vatican, July 2, 1963. While Jacqueline Kennedy met John XXIII in a private audience, JFK missed him by a month, instead visiting the newly-elected Pope Paul. They reportedly discussed civil rights.

4. Lyndon Johnson met Paul VI, New York, October 4, 1965. This meeting took place in the historical context of the first visit by a pope to the United States. Paul VI would visit and address the United Nations while he was in town.

5. Lyndon Johnson met Paul VI, the Vatican, December 23, 1967. This was the first repeat encounter between a particular pope and president. Johnson's record will be matched by Nixon and shattered by the likes of Reagan, Clinton and George W. Bush. Pope Paul will go on to meet two more presidents.

6. Richard Nixon met Paul VI, the Vatican, March 2, 1969.

7. Richard Nixon met Paul VI, the Vatican, September 29, 1970.

8. Gerald Ford met Paul VI, the Vatican, June 3, 1975. Ford was the fourth and final U.S. president met by Pope Paul. John Paul II would meet five.

9. Jimmy Carter met John Paul II, the White House, October 6, 1979. Along with being the first of 15 meetings between Pope John Paul and a sitting president, this was the first time a pope visited the White House, which would go unrepeated until 2008.

10. Jimmy Carter met John Paul II, the Vatican, June 21, 1980.

11. Ronald Reagan met John Paul II, the Vatican, June 7, 1982.

12. Ronald Reagan met John Paul II, Fairbanks, Alaska, May 2, 1984. Pope John Paul was stopping to refuel on his way to Seoul. President Reagan was on his way back from China. While quick and in passing, this meeting still allowed the two to speak about the pressing issues of the time. It also followed shortly after the U.S. and the Holy See formally opened diplomatic relations.

13. Ronald Reagan met John Paul II, the Vatican, June 6, 1987.

14. Ronald Reagan met John Paul II, Miami, September 10, 1987.

15. George Bush met John Paul II, the Vatican, May 27, 1989.

16. George Bush met John Paul II, the Vatican, November 8, 1991.

17. Bill Clinton met John Paul II, Denver, August 12, 1993. Pope John Paul was in town for World Youth Day.

18. Bill Clinton met John Paul II, the Vatican, June 2, 1994.

19. Bill Clinton met John Paul II, Newark, October 4, 1995.

20. Bill Clinton met John Paul II, St. Louis, January 26, 1999. President Clinton met with the pope more times on American soil than any other president. Of course, one could argue a traveler like JPII made it easy for him.

21. George W. Bush met John Paul II, Castel Gandolfo, July 23, 2001. This is the first and only time a pope received a president at the papal summer residence in Italy.

22. George W. Bush met John Paul II, the Vatican, May 28, 2002.

23. George W. Bush met John Paul II, the Vatican, June 4, 2004. President Bush presented Pope John Paul with the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

24. George W. Bush met Benedict XVI, the Vatican, June 9, 2007. It's worth noting that Bush, along with former Presidents Bush and Clinton, also attended the funeral of Pope John Paul II in April of 2005, which was also attended by then-Cardinals Joseph Ratzinger and Jorge Mario Bergoglio, S.J., the future Pope Benedict XVI and Pope Francis, respectively.

25. George W. Bush met Benedict XVI, the White House, April 16 2008. Bush also greeted Pope Benedict upon his arrival at Andrews Airforce Base. The White House reception included a birthday celebration for the pope.

26. George W. Bush met Benedict XVI, the Vatican, June 13, 2008. Until next week's meeting, Bush holds the distinction of being the only sitting U.S. president to meet two popes. He has also met with the pope the more times than any sitting president, six.

27. Barack Obama met Benedict XVI, the Vatican, July 10, 2009. Obama held a roundtable discussion with religion writers at the White House in anticipation of the meeting. Benedict presented Obama with a gift of the Vatican's recent document on bioethics.

CNS Photo.

Hat tip to AP for the list of historic dates and places.

MYSTICS FOR OUR TIME: MOTHER TERESA AND FATHER PEYTON

The centenary of the birth of Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta is August 26, and Time magazine has just released an illustrated book on the woman who is in in process of moving toward sainthood in the Catholic Church. Titled “Mother Teresa at 100: The Life and Works of a Modern Saint,” the book includes essays by some who knew her, including the Protestant pastor Rick Warren, Jesuit Father James Martin, Susan van Houte, who was adopted as an infant from one of Mother Teresa’s residences for expectant women in Calcutta, and Father Brian Kolodiejchuk, MC, a member of the priests’ society of Mother Teresa’s order, the Missionaries of Charity. Father Kolodiejchuk is official promoter for her sainthood cause.
I was perusing the book the same day I read a news report that the Baltimore Archdiocese had just sent Rome materials for the sainthood cause of Father Patrick Peyton. Father Peyton was the Holy Cross priest who marshaled radio and TV stars to promote the rosary and family prayer, first in the United States and then throughout the world. Materials from Baltimore included reports of healings through his intercession that, if accepted by the Vatican, would mean we’ll soon be speaking of Blessed Patrick Peyton.
I was lucky enough to personally meet each of them. Both had a beguiling charm. The diminutive nun made the richest of the rich know that the poorest of the poor were around them. The Nobel Prize winner drew the admiration of President Ronald Reagan, Queen Elizabeth and Princess Diana. Former California Governor Jerry Brown spent time working with her in Calcutta.
The tall, Irish-born Father Peyton befriended Hollywood mega-stars, from the crooner Bing Crosby to the starlet Loretta Young and got them and other show biz folk to work for Family Rosary and Family Theater. They helped shape his messages: “The family that prays together, stays together” and “A world at prayer is a world at peace” that were staples of posters and billboards in post-World War II society.
Yet charm alone was not the secret of their success. Each one was rooted in an intense, real, yet other worldly, relationship that grounded them, Mother Teresa with Jesus, and Father Peyton with the Virgin Mary. The relationships began to intensify when they were young adults and they focused everything they did on these relationships for the rest of their lives. Mother Teresa spoke of Jesus and Father Peyton of Mary as if they were standing by their side. I think they were.
I interviewed Mother Teresa a few times. She was a hard interviewee because she did not say much and repeated her message to love Jesus over and over again. It was a challenge to get 300 words for a newspaper article out of her. But I’d leave the interview knowing I had a message to deliver.
I knew Father Peyton better because his headquarters were in my hometown, Albany, New York. He was more loquacious than Mother Teresa but his message was always the same, the power of prayer to Mary. After each encounter I’d feel I had a special commission from God Himself to spread devotion to the Blessed Virgin.
Both Mother Teresa and Father Peyton touched people deeply, but their impacts went beyond impressing them with their accomplishments, many as they were. Each was a mystic who glimpsed the divine and then radiated holiness without their knowing it. It wasn’t something they spoke about specifically. Mother Teresa and Father Peyton were gifts to the 20th Century and proof that holiness can be within our reach even or because of the chaotic world in which we live.