President Barack Obama will no doubt attempt to use Thursday’s meeting with Pope Francis as a platform to promote his political agenda at home, especially as it relates to poverty and income inequality.
It’s no secret that Pope Francis has made these issues central components of the first year of his papacy — nor that the president has already tried to exploit this. Not long after the pontiff released his 47,000-word apostolic exhortation, Evangelii Gaudium, Obama lifted language directly from the document in a partisan speech of his own.
