President Joe Biden confirmed Wednesday that he will not be attending the funeral of Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI.
The funeral for the former pontiff — who died on Dec. 31 at 95 — will take place Thursday in Rome, with Pope Francis presiding, according to The Christian Post.
EWTN’s Owen Jensen pressed Biden, who is often described by media outlets as a “devout Catholic,” at the White House on Wednesday why he will not be traveling to the Vatican.
“You’re not attending his funeral tomorrow though, why?” Jensen asked.
“Well, why do you think?” Biden responded.
“Well, you tell me,” Jensen countered.
Biden again demurred, saying, “You know why.”
Jensen pushed further: “You can tell me.”
Do you think Biden was uninvited from Pope Benedict’s funeral?
Yes: 100% (39 Votes)
No: 0% (0 Votes)
“The reason I’m not attending the funeral tomorrow is because it would take an entourage of a thousand people to show up,” Biden said. “We would move everything in the wrong direction.”
The president added that he inquired about attending, but concluded, “We would just get in the way.”
Joe Biden gets pressed on why he’s not attending the funeral.
“You know why…” pic.twitter.com/5Y1REkVrXb
— Kevin McMahon (@Kevin__McMahon) January 4, 2023
White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre seemed to say Tuesday that Biden was not invited to attend the funeral.
“The U.S. Ambassador to the Holy See, Joe Donnelly, will represent the United States at the funeral of the pope, in line with the wishes of the late pope and the Vatican,” she told reporters.
“This is what — this is what their requests were. This is what their wishes were. And so, that’s what you’re seeing from the U.S.,” Jean-Pierre added.
Joe Biden will not attend Pope Benedict XVI’s funeral, per request of the Vatican. pic.twitter.com/Q7VcYEhnei
— Kevin McMahon (@Kevin__McMahon) January 3, 2023
So the question is, did the Vatican not want Biden to attend because of the logistics of having a U.S. president there, or because of his far-left positions on abortion and LGBT issues?
Perhaps it’s both.
Catholic News Agency reported that only Germany and Italy will be sending official state delegations.
Benedict, formerly Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, was German-born and lived in Italy for more than 40 years.
Biden has taken the most liberal views on abortion, arguably, of any his predecessors.
He called the Supreme Court’s ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization this summer “outrageous behavior.”
Biden issued an executive order seeking to blunt as much impact as possible of the ruling, which overturned Roe v. Wade.
He also threw his full support behind the Women’s Health Protection Act, which went even further than Roe v. Wade in making abortion legal late into the pregnancy nationwide.
Biden called for ending the Senate filibuster to pass such legislation.
The Christian Post reported that before Benedict became pope, he sent a letter “to high-ranking Catholic Church leaders in the U.S. urging them to withhold communion from pro-abortion Catholic politicians because ‘abortion or euthanasia is a grave sin.’”
In addition to promoting abortions, the Biden administration decided to fly the LGBT flag at the U.S. embassy in The Vatican in June of 2021, which probably did not go over well, given the Catholic Church’s support of traditional marriage and gender definitions.
The U.S. Embassy to the Holy See celebrates #PrideMonth with the Pride flag on display during the month of June. The United States respects the dignity and equality of LGBTQI+ people. LGBTQI+ rights are human rights. pic.twitter.com/Xentlnr16E
— U.S. in Holy See (@USinHolySee) June 1, 2021
Whether the Vatican did not want Biden to attend Benedict’s funeral for logistical or moral reasons is not clear, but Biden has shown himself to be less than a “devout Catholic” in the policies he has pursued as president.
