Dean Herrington said he has been let go as football coach at St. Francis after five seasons during which his teams won three league championships and made two Southern Section finals.
The team went 2-8 this season and failed to make the playoffs in a season in which there were numerous injuries at the quarterback position. St. Francis ended the regular season with a stunning 28-21 win over Cathedral.
Herrington also enjoyed success as head coach at Bishop Alemany and Paraclete. He said Wednesday night, “It was shocking but maybe a good parting of ways.” The school told him there were concerns about culture and morale issues.
Herrington should be quick to pick up offers from other high schools and junior colleges. He has been known for developing top quarterbacks.
He took over at St. Francis for his good friend and former Hart player, the late Jim Bonds.
Francis Ford Coppola wants an offer he can’t refuse — on his timepieces.
The Academy Award-winning director is selling seven watches from his personal collection, including his custom F.P. Journe FFC Prototype, estimated to sell for more than $1 million, according to a statement from Phillips, the New York City-based auction house. Phillips will hold the auction on Dec. 6 and 7.
The sale could help stanch losses from last year’s box-office flop “Megalopolis,” which cost over $120 million to make and was largely financed by the 86-year-old director. The movie grossed only $14.3 million worldwide.
The film, Coppola’s first since his 2011 horror movie “Twixt,” premiered at Cannes last year to largely negative reviews. The Times’ Joshua Rothkopf called it a “wildly ambitious, overstuffed city epic.”
At a news conference at Cannes, Coppola discussed the tremendous amount of his own money that he had sunk into the film, saying that he “never cared about money” and that his children “don’t need a fortune.”
Among the Coppola timepieces also going under the hammer are examples from Patek Philippe, Blancpain and IWC.
But the headlining piece is the F.P. Journe FFC Prototype that features a black titanium, human-like hand that resembles a steampunk gauntlet that articulates the hours when the fingers extend or retract.
Francis Ford Coppola’s custom F.P. Journe FFC timepiece uses a single hand to indicate all 12 hours.
(Phillips)
The watch was a collaboration between Coppola and master watchmaker François-Paul Journe that began following a conversation the pair had during a visit he made to the filmmaker’s Inglenook winery in Napa Valley in 2012.
Coppola asked Journe if a human hand had ever been used to mark time. That question sparked a years-long conversation during which the watchmaker grappled with how to indicate the 12 hours of the dial using just five fingers.
Journe found his inspiration in Ambroise Paré, a 16th century French barber surgeon and an innovator of prosthetic limbs in particular, including Le Petit Lorrain, a prosthetic hand made of iron and leather that featured hidden gears and springs enabling the fingers to move, not dissimilar to a watch mechanism.
“Speaking with Francis in 2012 and hearing his idea on the use of a human hand to indicate time inspired me to create a watch I never could have imagined myself. The challenge was formidable — exactly the type of watchmaking project I adore,” said Journe in a statement.
Journe eventually created six prototypes and delivered Coppola’s watch to him in 2021.
“I’m proud to fully support the sale of this watch through Phillips to fund the creation of his artistic masterpieces in filmmaking,” he said.
Coppola first became interested in the watchmaker when he gifted his wife Eleanor an F.P. Journe Chronomètre à Résonance in platinum with a white gold dial for Christmas in 2009, prompting the director to extend an invitation to Journe to visit him at his Napa winery.
Eleanor Coppola, a documentary filmmaker and writer, died in 2024 after 61 years of marriage. Her F.P. Journe timepiece is also part of the auction and is estimated to fetch between $120,000 to $240,000.
With a sixth year of basketball eligibility at UC Irvine, former St. Francis High guard Andre Henry has become so familiar with coach Russell Turner that both consider each other family.
Henry, who was injured last season after nine games, is back healthy, and Turner thinks he’s ready to be a standout on offense and defense this season.
He calls Henry one of the finest recruits he ever signed out of St. Francis in 2020. In 2023-24, he was the Big West Conference defensive player of the year.
“Andre was probably the top-ranked recruit we ever got,” said Turner, in his 16th season. “I watched him elevate his team at St. Francis and he’s still that type of personality. I’m thrilled where is right now and he’s going to have a great season on both sides of the ball. There’s not a limit he can accomplish.”
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UC Irvine men’s basketball coach talks about how Andre Henry has become a standout on the court for the Anteaters.
Turner said he’s grateful for Henry’s loyalty and commitment to the UC Irvine basketball program.
“Andre has become family with me and my staff,” he said. “He’s made great sacrifices to remain in our program. I think he sees we’re committed to him and I certainly see how committed he and his family have been to us. Hopefully, we can write the end to a great story in his sixth year.”
This is a daily look at the positive happenings in high school sports. To submit any news, please email [email protected].
Wearing size 17 shoes and standing 7-foot-3, Cherif Millogo is under the basket holding up his arms and touching the rim without leaving the ground. The rest of the “tiny” people in the St. Francis High gym are gawking in awe at his 7-9 wingspan.
That includes 6-8 head coach Todd Wolfson, who has twice won the basketball coaching lottery by having his second 7-footer show up out of nowhere. The first was 7-0 Belgium exchange student Gilles Dierickx when he was coaching at Chaminade in 2017.
This time, Wolfson received a phone call from an administrator at St. Francis in August.
“There’s a 7-3 kid wanting to come to St. Francis,” the administrator said.
“I thought he was lying,” Wolfson said.
Millogo didn’t play last season while attending the Cambridge Arts, Technology and Science Academy in Boston after tearing a knee ligament. He’s from the tiny West Africa country Burkina Faso. He was a soccer player until he had a growth spurt, participated in a basketball camp and was spotted playing in Togo, a country bordering Ghana. He ended up moving to Florida two years ago. He said he learned how to shoot a basketball watching YouTube videos of Kevin Durant.
St. Francis coach Todd Wolfson, who’s 6-foot-8, is no longer the tallest person in the gym. Cherif Millogo is 7-3 and a native of Burkina Faso.
(Eric Sondheimer / Los Angeles Times)
He speaks French, English and two tribal languages. He has a 7-foot older brother and his father is 6-8. He turned 18 on Sept. 27, which means he has two years of high school eligibility left. His guardian is former UCLA and NBA player Luc Richard Mbah a Moute, who came here from Cameroon.
Millogo was instantly embraced around St. Francis because of his engaging, friendly personality. During a practice, while listening in a circle around Wolfson, he had his arms around a teammate as if they were lifelong friends.
“He’s made me a better person,” Wolfson said. “His values are amazing.”
Millogo said his parents taught him to be respectful and friendly.
“For me, it’s natural,” he said.
Sophomore guard Luke Paulus said players were as surprised as Wolfson to learn about Millogo’s arrival.
“No way,” he said when he heard about the rumors. “First day of school, I saw him. ‘Wow, that’s a big human being.’ He’s a fun guy.”
Millogo, who’s Muslim, said attending a Catholic school is good. “I’m learning about new religions,” he said.
He also can show off his soccer skills if asked by juggling a ball with his feet.
Millogo joins an already talent-filled Mission League with the No. 1 class of 2026 prospect, Tyran Stokes of Sherman Oaks Notre Dame, and top five 2026 prospect, Brandon McCoy of Sierra Canyon.
Cherif Millogo towers over his new St. Francis High teammates.
(Eric Sondheimer / Los Angeles Times)
Millogo was asked if he was aware of Stokes and McCoy.
“From social media,” he said.
See what having an Instagram account can do to promote a high school basketball program? He said he saw a social media post of St. Francis’ students cheering at a game.
To say there could be lots of alley-oop passes this season for St. Francis might be an understatement. Wolfson, who has used a matchup zone defense at times during his coaching days, is teasing how it might make a return with Millogo in the middle. And he’s already planning for some new out-of-bounds plays trying to take advantage of Millogo’s height.
Millogo looks like a sold free-throw shooter and shot-blocker. Then there’s dunking with ease. He had nine dunks last weekend in a fall league game in which he scored 32 points. The previous game, he had 24 points, including five dunks. He should be eligible immediately next month when the season officially begins based on the fact he didn’t play last season, but St. Francis has yet to submit his transfer paperwork.
One thing is certain: The St. Francis student section and many other fans are going to be entertained watching Millogo deliver dunk after dunk.
Thursday marks the 24th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks that saw two planes flown into the Twin Towers in New York, killing nearly 3,000.
Kevin Danni was there. The St. Francis High graduate and father of Golden Knights linebacker Luke Danni reflects back every anniversary on how he escaped from the 61st floor of the South Tower.
“I’m so lucky there were so many who sacrificed to save me,” he said.
Danni told his story to a rapt audience earlier this week at a meeting of the YMCA of the Foothills QB Club, where he is president.
He was 22 years old, a recent graduate of Occidental College and had been sent to Morgan Stanley in New York to begin training at the Twin Towers on Sept. 10, 2001. The next morning, a training meeting ended up being 15 minutes late because a speaker went too long, so during a break, he decided not to go to the observation deck on the 107th floor.
Instead, he looked out a window and saw what he thought was confetti flying around, It was papers from the aftermath of a plane running into the North Tower. Soon he saw a fire. At first, evacuation from the South Tower was not recommended. But Danni said the head of security, Rick Rescorla, overrode orders and told everyone to leave.
When Danni reached the 55th floor walking down the stairs, he heard an explosion. “The walls cracked,” he said.
It was a plane hitting the South Tower.
“I knew it was a terrorist attack,” he said. “I started to descend and passed firefighters going up the stairs. It took 45 minutes to evacuate.”
When he went outside, he said, “I saw both on fire.”
He went to find a pay phone so he could call his loved ones and tell them he was OK. Then the towers started to collapse.
“I heard a rumble,” he said. “It was 57 minutes since the plane hit. I saw the dust cloud. I turned and ran.”
Danni said he learned the security man, Rescorla, after escorting employees outside, went back up to make sure all had been evacuated from the office. The security man and 343 firefighters perished trying to help others.
“I got to see so many acts of heroism,” Danni said.
He was dating his future wife, Helena, at the time. They eventually married and their son, Luke, was born. This week he’ll be having fun watching Luke play quarterback for St. Francis on Friday night against Muir.
“Every 9/11, he says, ‘Dad, I’m glad you’re here,’” Kevin said.
This is a daily look at the positive happenings in high school sports. To submit any news, please email [email protected].
Emma Raducanu says she is “excited” to be working with Rafael Nadal’s former coach Francis Roig as she prepares for this year’s US Open.
The 22-year-old had been working with British coach Mark Petchey on an informal basis since March and has now added Spaniard Roig to her team full-time.
Roig, 57, worked alongside Nadal’s uncle Toni from 2005 to 2022 and was part of all 22 of the Spaniard’s Grand Slam victories.
“He’s obviously got a bank of experience and I’m very excited to continue working with him and to have him on my side,” Raducanu told Sky Sports.
The British number one is playing in the Cincinnati Open for the first time since 2022 this week and will face either fellow Briton Katie Boulter or Serb Olga Danilovic in her opening match after receiving a first-round bye.
Roig has joined Raducanu for the WTA 1,000 event in Ohio, which is the last tournament before the final Grand Slam of the season begins in New York on 24 August.
“It’s going really well,” Raducanu said. “It’s my second day with [Roig] here, but I did a few days in London before I came out here.”
Connie Francis, the angelic-voiced singer who was one of the biggest recording stars of the late 1950s and early 1960s, has died. She was 87.
Her friend and publicist, Ron Roberts, announced the singer’s death Thursday, according to the Associated Press.
A month prior to her death, Francis was hospitalized for “extreme pain” following a fracture in her pelvic area. The singer, who shared details about her health with fans on social media, used a wheelchair in her later years and said she lived with a “troublesome painful hip.”
Francis emerged when rock ’n’ roll first captivated America. Her earliest hits — a dreamy arrangement of the old standard “Who’s Sorry Now?,” the cheerfully silly “Stupid Cupid” and the galloping “Lipstick on Your Collar” — fit neatly into the emerging genre’s lighter side. Although she targeted teen listeners with such songs as the spring break anthem “Where the Boys Are,” Francis ultimately gravitated toward the middle of the road, singing softly lit, tasteful pop for adult audiences.
Francis’ commercial peak roughly spanned from Elvis Presley’s induction into the U.S. Army to the Beatles first setting foot on American soil. Over that five-year period, Francis was one of the biggest stars in music, earning three No. 1 hits: “Everybody’s Somebody’s Fool,” “My Heart Has a Mind of Its Own” and “Don’t Break the Heart That Loves You.” As her singles offered familiar adolescent fare, her albums were constructed for specific demographics. During the early ’60s, she cut records dedicated to “Italian Favorites,” “Rock ’n’ Roll Million Sellers,” “Country & Western,” “Fun Songs for Children,” “Jewish Favorites” and “Spanish and Latin American Favorites,” even recording versions of her hits in Italian, German, Spanish and Japanese.
This adaptability became a considerable asset once her pop hits dried up in the mid-’60s. Francis continued to be a popular concert attraction through the 1960s, her live success sustaining her as she eased into adult contemporary fare. A number of personal tragedies stalled her career in the 1970s, but by the ’90s, her life stabilized enough for her to return to the stage, playing venues in Las Vegas, Atlantic City and elsewhere until her retirement in the 2010s.
Connie Francis circa 1960.
(Archive Photos/Getty Images)
Connie Francis was born Concetta Maria Franconero on Dec. 12, 1938, in Newark, N.J. When she was 3, her father bought her an accordion and she spent her childhood learning Italian folk songs. By age 10, her parents enrolled her in local talent contests. When her father attempted to book her on the New York-based television show “Startime,” producer George Scheck only agreed because Francis played the accordion and he was “up to here in singers.” Francis remained a fixture on “Startime” through her early teens — Scheck served as her manager during these formative years — during which time she also appeared on Arthur Grodfrey’s “Talent Scouts.” Godfrey stumbled over her Italian name, suggesting she shorten it to something “easy and Irish,” thereby giving birth to her stage name.
Scheck managed to secure Francis a record contract with MGM in 1955. As she received work dubbing her singing voice for film actresses — she subbed for Tuesday Weld in 1956’s “Rock, Rock, Rock” and Freda Holloway in 1957’s “Jamboree” — MGM steadily attempted to move her from pop to rock. Nothing clicked until Francis recorded “Who’s Sorry Now?” as a favor to her father, giving the 1923 tune a romantic sway.
“Who’s Sorry Now?” caught the ear of Dick Clark, who regularly played the record on his “American Bandstand,” which had just expanded into the national market. Clark’s endorsement helped break “Who’s Sorry Now?” and sent it into the Billboard Top 10. MGM attempted to replicate its success by having Francis spruce up old chestnuts, but to no avail. The singer didn’t have another hit until she cut “Stupid Cupid,” a song co-written by Neil Sedaka and Howie Greenfield, a pair of young songwriters at the Brill Building who were navigating the distance separating Broadway-bound pop and rock ’n’ roll.
“Stupid Cupid” was the first of many hits she’d have with the songwriters, including the slinky ‘Fallin’” and the ballad “Frankie.” She later said, “Neil and Howie never failed to come up with a hit for me. It was a great marriage. We thought the same way.” Sedaka and Greenfield weren’t the only Brill Building songwriters to command Francis’ attention: She developed a romance with a pre-fame Bobby Darin, who was chased away by her father.
Over the next few years, Francis recorded both standards and new songs from Sedaka and Greenfield, along with material from other emerging songwriters, such as George Goehring and Edna Lewis, who wrote the lively “Lipstick on Your Collar.” Within less than two years, her popularity was such that MGM released five different Connie Francis LPs for Christmas 1959: a set of holiday tunes, a greatest-hits record, an LP dedicated to country, one dedicated to rock ’n’ roll and a set of Italian music, performed partially in the original language.
Connie Francis and Neil Sedaka in 2007.
(George Napolitano / FilmMagic / Getty Images)
With her popularity at an apex, Connie Francis made her cinematic debut in the 1960 teen comedy “Where the Boys Are,” which also featured a Sedaka and Greenfield song as its theme. Francis appeared in three quasi-sequels culminating in 1965’s “When the Boys Meet the Girls,” but she never felt entirely comfortable onscreen, preferring live performance. “Vacation” became her last Top 10 single in 1962 — the same year she published the book “For Every Young Heart: Connie Francis Talks to Teenagers.” Too young to be an oldies act, Francis spent the remainder of the 1960s chasing a few trends — in 1968, she released “Connie & Clyde — Hit Songs of the ’30s,” a rushed attempt to cash in on the popularity of Arthur Penn’s controversial hit film “Bonnie and Clyde” — while busying herself on a showbiz circuit that encompassed Vegas, television variety shows and singing for troops in Vietnam.
A comeback attempt in the early 1970s was swiftly derailed by tragedy. After appearing at Long Island’s Westbury Music Fair on Nov. 8, 1974, she was sexually assaulted in her Howard Johnson’s hotel room; the culprit was never caught. Francis sued the hotel chain; she’d later win a $2.5-million settlement that helped reshape security practices in the hospitality industry. As she was recovering from her assault, she underwent a nasal surgery that went astray, leading her to lose her voice for years; it took three subsequent surgeries before she regained her ability to sing. Francis spent much of the remainder of the ’70s battling severe depression, but once her voice returned, recordings happened on occasion, including a disco version of “Where the Boys Are” in 1978.
Connie Francis.
(ullstein bild via Getty Images)
Francis returned to the public eye in the early 1980s, first as a victims rights activist, then as a live performer. Her comeback was marred by further tragedy — the murder of her brother George, a lawyer who became a government witness after pleading guilty to bank fraud; the police indicated the killing was related to organized crime.
Francis continued to work in the wake of his death, playing shows and writing her 1984 autobiography, “Who’s Sorry Now?,” but she continued to be plagued with personal problems. She told the Village Voice’s Michael Musto, “In the ’80s I was involuntarily committed to mental institutions 17 times in nine years in five different states. I was misdiagnosed as bipolar, ADD, ADHD, and a few other letters the scientific community had never heard of.” After receiving a diagnosis for post-traumatic stress disorder, Francis returned to live performances in the 1990s; one of her shows was documented on “The Return Concert Live at Trump’s Castle,” a 1996 album that was her last major-label release. When asked by the Las Vegas Sun in 2004 if life was still a struggle, she responded, “Not for the past 12 years.”
Francis regularly played casinos and theaters in the 2000s as she developed a biopic of her life with Gloria Estefan, who planned to play the former teen idol. The film never materialized. In 2010, Francis became the national spokesperson for Mental Health America’s trauma campaign. By the end of the 2010s, she retired to Parkland, Fla., and published her second memoir, “Among My Souvenirs: The Real Story, Vol. 1,” in 2017.
Connie Francis married four times. Her first marriage, to Dick Kanellis in 1964, ended after three months; her second, to Izzy Marion, lasted from 1971 to 1972. She adopted a child with her third husband, Joseph Garzilli, to whom she was wed from 1973 to 1978. Her fourth marriage, to Bob Parkinson, ended in 1986 after one year.
Recording star Connie Francis says she is on the mend after a recent trip to the hospital to address some “extreme pain.”
The “Stupid Cupid” and “Lipstick on Your Collar” singer, who rose to fame in the late 1950s and early ‘60s, informed fans on Facebook that she is receiving care after undergoing tests and exams. “Thank you all for your kind thoughts, words and prayers,” she wrote Wednesday.
Earlier Wednesday, the 87-year-old “Pretty Little Baby” singer wrote on Facebook that she went to the hospital to learn more about the cause of her pain, which she said prompted her to call off an upcoming Fourth of July performance, her latest cancellation in recent weeks. Francis’ posts this week did not disclose much information about her condition, but a previous Facebook update provided some insight.
A week prior to her hospitalization, Francis announced on Facebook that she had been dealing with “pelvic pain on the right side” and underwent tests to determine “that this is due to a fracture.”
“It looks like I may have to rely on my wheelchair a little longer than anticipated,” she wrote, adding that she had to pull out of a then-upcoming performance.
Francis gave followers more information about her health in March, telling them in another Facebook post that she uses a wheelchair to avoid putting “undue pressure on a troublesome painful hip” and that she was awaiting stem cell therapy at the time.
Francis has spoken openly about her personal afflictions over the course of her career. She told the Village Voice in 2011 that she had been committed to several mental institutions in the ‘80s. She said she was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder after she was misdiagnosed with other mental health conditions, including bipolar disorder, ADD and ADHD.
The singer, also known for “Where the Boys Are” and “Everybody’s Somebody’s Fool,” recently had her music go viral on TikTok as users use her “Pretty Little Baby” for videos.
“I’m still astounded by the popularity of ‘Pretty Little Baby,’” she said last week, thanking the A-listers who have used her hit in their social media videos.
UFC president Dana White says he cannot stop Jon Jones from retiring, despite the American having “agreed” to fight Tom Aspinall.
White was responding to the social media activity of the UFC heavyweight champion, who suggested he was retired before calling out ex-UFC fighter Francis Ngannou.
Speaking at the UFC 316 post-fight news conference, White said 37-year-old Jones had said nothing about retiring to him and that he was only interested in matching him with Aspinall.
“Tom Aspinall is the guy. If the guy wants to retire and doesn’t want to fight, there’s nothing you can do,” White said.
“I didn’t want Khabib [Nurmagomedov] to retire, I thought [Daniel Cormier] should’ve stayed in it longer, so it’s none of my business.
“I’ll do what I can to make the fight, if we can, if he’s talking that crazy, I didn’t realise that.”
With Ngannou fuelling speculation he might be open to a return to the UFC, White played down the chances even if it was to fight Jones.
Southern California is where golf prodigies Tiger Woods and Patrick Cantlay first began to receive attention as youths, and 14-year-old Jaden Soong, a member of the Class of 2028 at St. Francis High in La Canada, is on the same path.
On Tuesday, he mastered Poppy Hills Country Club, shooting a nine-under-par 62 to win the CIF state championship in Pebble Beach. He had no bogies, seven birdies and an eagle. He’s believed to be the youngest to win a CIF individual golf title. PGA winners Cantlay (Servite) and Rickie Fowler (Murrieta Valley) are former winners of the event.
Soong only earned a chance to play on Tuesday by winning two playoffs to receive the invite as an at-large competitor. He said he hadn’t played Poppy Hills since he was 7 or 8 but got a round in before Tuesday’s competition.
He had two birdies and an eagle on the front nine. Then came birdies on No. 10 and No. 11 to go to six under par. He and Evan Liu of Torrey Pines started to pull away from the rest of the field on the par-71 course. Liu was in the clubhouse at seven under after making a birdie on No. 18 to finish with a 64, with Soong at six under with six holes to play.
Soong tied Liu at seven under with a birdie on No. 14, a 369-yard par-four hole. Then he went to eight under with a birdie on the par-three No. 17.
He hit a perfect drive on No. 18, a 503-yard par-five hole and had a 13-foot putt for an eagle before settling for a tap in birdie.
Soong loves pressure and showed his comfort level throughout a round to remember.
Jaden Soong, a freshman golfer at St. Francis High, thrives under pressure.
“I will say I like pressure,” he said.
Twice in the last two weeks, he has won playoffs to keep his season going. But the story of his first playoff win is comedy at its best.
He had left the Temecula Creek Golf Club at the Southern Section individual championships after concluding he had failed to qualify for the SCGA regionals and stopped at Jack in the Box to get food for the ride home. Then he got a phone call from a friend: “Hey dude, we’re in a playoff.”
He was 17 minutes away from the course and needed to be back in 10 minutes. “We hauled it,” he said.
Thankfully, there were no police with radar guns in the vicinity as he was driven back to the course.
The playoff had already started when he arrived. Players were in the fairway. He had no time to change into his golf shoes, so he played in his Nike Air Force shoes. He got a par on the first hole, then a birdie to win the playoff and advance. Last weekend, he won another playoff to reach the state championships on Tuesday at Poppy Hills in Pebble Beach.
The 14-year-old is ready for anything.
This is a daily look at the positive happenings in high school sports. To submit any news, please email [email protected].
VATICAN CITY — Throughout President Biden’s life, his religion has been a refuge. He fingers a rosary during moments of stress and often attends Mass at the church in Delaware where his son Beau is buried.
But as Biden and Pope Francis prepared for a tete-a-tete Friday at the Vatican — the president’s first stop while traveling in Europe for two international summits — both the flocks they lead, the American people and the Roman Catholic Church, are beset by divisions and contradictions that at times seem irreconcilable.
For the record:
4:56 a.m. Oct. 29, 2021A previous version of this story misstated the day of President Biden and Pope Francis’ meeting. The two leaders met Friday, not Thursday.
“They preside over fractured communities,” said Massimo Faggioli, a theology professor at Villanova University who wrote a book about Biden and Catholicism. “They face situations with many similarities.”
The two leaders met for 90 minutes early Friday afternoon, according to the White House, which was longer than expected. Later in the day, Biden said they prayed together for peace and that Francis blessed his rosary.
The president said the conversation focused on the “moral responsibility” of dealing with climate change — the topic of an upcoming summit in Glasgow, Scotland. The president added that they did not discuss abortion. Biden supports abortion rights, a contradiction of Catholic doctrine that is common among Democrats.
“We just talked about the fact that he was happy I was a good Catholic,” Biden said, adding that Francis told him he should continue to receive Communion.
It was a significant statement from the pope on an issue that has stirred political and spiritual controversy over the relationship between politicians who support abortion rights and the church.
Conservative Catholic bishops in the United States are arguing that political leaders who support abortion rights should not receive Communion — the ritual where a priest consecrates bread and wine and then shares it with believers — and the issue is slated for debate during an upcoming episcopal meeting in Baltimore. Because the proposal gained steam after Biden’s election, it’s been viewed as a rebuke of the president.
The controversy reflects an internal debate over whether the Catholic Church should broaden its appeal or adhere more strictly to its core tenets. George Weigel, a distinguished senior fellow at the conservative Ethics and Public Policy Center, said some people “claim to be Catholic and yet want to turn Catholicism into a version of liberal Protestantism.”
“What the bishops are discussing is whether Catholic political leaders who are not in full communion with the church because they act in ways that contradict settled Catholic teaching should have the integrity not to present themselves for Holy Communion,” he said.
The Vatican, however, has been wary of a debate that mixes politics and one of the church’s holiest rituals. Francis said last month that he has “never refused the Eucharist to anyone.” Since becoming pope eight years ago, he has sought to distance himself from divisive topics such as same-sex marriage while focusing on more ecumenical issues.
John K. White, professor of politics at the Catholic University of America in Washington, said the pope’s meeting with Biden “sends a message to the American bishops that denying Communion is not something that he approves of.”
The news media were not allowed into the meeting or to catch a glimpse of Biden and Francis together. The Vatican released video of part of an encounter that appeared affectionate, even chummy. At one point, Biden handed the pope a commemorative coin.
“The tradition is, and I’m only kidding about this, the next time I see you and you don’t have it, you have to buy the drinks,” said Biden, who joked that he’s probably the only Irishman that Francis has ever met who doesn’t drink.
The president bid farewell to the pope with a phrase that has become something of a trademark for him — “God love you.”
Biden and Francis have met several times before, starting with a brief encounter when Biden, then vice president, attended Francis’ papal inauguration in 2013.
Then-presidential candidate Joe Biden leaves a church in Wilmington, Del., last year after attending a confirmation Mass for his granddaughter.
(Patrick Semansky / Associated Press)
Two years later, Biden welcomed Francis to the U.S. and brought his family to a private meeting with him shortly after Beau died.
“I wish every grieving parent, brother or sister, mother or father would have had the benefit of his words, his prayers, his presence,” Biden said the following year during a visit to the Vatican, where he met Francis again.
Biden is only the second Catholic president after John F. Kennedy, who was elected in 1960. At that time, the church was still viewed with suspicion by some Americans, and Kennedy assured voters that he believed in the separation of church and state — another way of saying that he would follow the Constitution, not the pope, while in office.
Now, Catholics are represented in the highest levels of American public life. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a San Francisco Democrat, is Catholic, as is one of her predecessors, John Boehner, a Republican from Ohio. The majority of Supreme Court justices are Catholic.
Biden keeps a photo of him with Francis in the Oval Office among an assortment of family photos.
The president attends Mass once a week, even when traveling. He made a point of visiting a church during a 2001 trip to China while he was chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
“I’m going to be there on a Sunday — can I go to church somewhere?” Biden said, according to Frank Januzzi, one of the future president’s staff members at the time.
Although there were large Catholic churches in Beijing where Biden could have attended Mass, he ultimately visited what Januzzi described as a “tiny, hole-in-the-wall” parish in a village outside the Chinese capital. Biden took Communion from an elderly priest there.
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“This was an opportunity to make a statement about the importance of freedom of religion and demonstrate his own faith as well,” said Januzzi, who now leads the Mansfield Foundation, an organization dedicated to fostering U.S.-Asia relations.
White, the university professor, recalled attending Mass at a church in Bethesda, Md., in 2015 when Biden and his wife slipped in. It was unexpected, because it was not Biden’s usual parish, but Beau was hospitalized nearby with brain cancer and was near death.
Even from a distance, White said, “You could tell they were in distress.” They received Communion and exchanged the sign of peace — when parishioners shake hands and exchange greetings — and left.
Beau’s death was just one of the tragedies that have shaped Biden’s life. In 1972, his first wife and daughter were killed in a car accident shortly after he was first elected to the Senate.
“When people have tragedy, sometimes their faith goes away, or is forged in steel,” White said. “All the tragedies that have beset Biden have reinforced his faith and who he is.”
ROME — U.S. Vice President JD Vance extended an invitation to Pope Leo XIV to visit the United States during a meeting at the Vatican on Monday ahead of a flurry of U.S.-led diplomatic efforts to make progress on a ceasefire in Russia’s war in Ukraine.
Vance gave the first American pope a letter from President Trump and the first lady inviting him. The Chicago-born pope took the letter and put it on his desk and was heard saying “at some point,” in the video footage of the meeting provided by Vatican Media.
Vance, who converted to Catholicism in 2019, also gave the Augustinian pope a copy of two of St. Augustine’s most seminal works, “The City of God” and “On Christian Doctrine,” the vice president’s office said. Another gift: A Chicago Bears T-shirt with Leo’s name on it.
“As you can probably imagine, people in the United States are extremely excited about you,” Vance told Leo as they exchanged gifts.
Leo gave Vance a bronze sculpture with the words in Italian “Peace is a fragile flower,” and a coffee-table sized picture book of the papal apartments in the Apostolic Palace. Leo noted that Francis had chosen not to live in them and added, “And I may live in, but it’s not totally decided.”
Vance led the U.S. delegation to Sunday’s formal Mass opening the pontificate of the first American pope. Joining him at the meeting on Monday was Secretary of State Marco Rubio, also a Catholic, Vance spokesperson Luke Schroeder said. The two then also met with the Vatican foreign minister, Archbishop Paul Gallagher.
“There was an exchange of views on some current international issues, calling for respect for humanitarian law and international law in areas of conflict and for a negotiated solution between the parties involved,” according to a Vatican statement after their meeting.
According to the photo of the visits released by the Vatican, Leo’s brother, Louis Prevost, a self-described “MAGA-type,” and his wife, Deborah, joined the delegation during the visit.
The Vatican listed Vance’s delegation as the first of several private audiences Leo was having Monday with people who had come to Rome for his inaugural Mass, including other Christian leaders and a group of faithful from his old diocese in Chiclayo, Peru.
The Vatican, which was largely sidelined during the first three years of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, has offered to host any peace talks while continuing humanitarian efforts to facilitate prisoner swaps and reunite Ukrainian children taken by Russia.
After greeting Leo briefly at the end of Sunday’s Mass, Vance spent the rest of the day in separate meetings, including with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. He also met with European Union Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and Italy’s Premier Giorgia Meloni, who said she hoped the trilateral meeting could be a “new beginning.”
In the evening, Meloni spoke by phone with U.S. President Trump and several other European leaders ahead of Trump’s expected call with Russia’s President Vladimir Putin on Monday, according to a statement from Meloni’s office.
‘Every effort’
Leo, the former Cardinal Robert Prevost, is a Chicago-born Augustinian missionary who spent the bulk of his ministry in Chiclayo, a commercial city of around 800,000 on Peru’s northern Pacific coast.
In the days since his May 8 election, Leo has vowed “every effort” to help bring peace to Ukraine. He also has emphasized his continuity with Pope Francis, who made caring for migrants and the poor a priority of his pontificate.
Before his election, Prevost shared news articles on X that were critical of the Trump administration’s plans for mass deportations of migrants.
Vance was one of the last foreign officials to meet with Francis before the Argentine pope’s April 21 death. The two had tangled over migration, with Francis publicly rebuking the Trump administration’s deportation plan and correcting Vance’s theological justification for it.
Winfield and Martin write for the Associated Press.
