Bernie Sanders Meets With Pope Francis Following Vatican Appearance
ROME (CBSNewYork/AP) -- Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders said that he met with Pope Francis on Saturday morning.
Sanders says the meeting took place before the pope left for his one-day visit to Greece. He says he told the pope he appreciated the message that he is sending the world about the need to inject morality and justice into the world economy. Sanders says it's a message he has been sending as well.
Pope Francis says he briefly greeted U.S. presidential candidate Bernie Sanders and the two shook hands, and he describes the encounter as a sign of good manners, "nothing more.''
The pope says it wasn't evidence that he was getting mixed up in American politics.
Francis says Sanders -- along with Sanders' wife and another couple -- were in the lobby of the Vatican hotel where the pope lives, when he left for a trip to Greece on Saturday morning.
Francis says, "When I came down, I greeted them, shook their hands and nothing more. It's good manners.''
The pope then added with a laugh: "If someone thinks that greeting someone means getting mixed up in politics, they should see a psychiatrist.''
Sanders called the meeting 'an honor and a joy,' CBS2 reported.
Sanders traveled to Rome to attend a Vatican conference on economic inequality and climate change. He is an admirer of the pope and has praised the pope's views on poverty and the environment. The Sanders campaign said there was no political motivation behind the senator's one-day trip.
The Vermont senator is challenging Hillary Clinton for the Democratic nomination.
Clinton and Sanders aggressively challenged each other's judgment to be president at a raucous Democratic debate in Brooklyn Thursday night over Wall Street banks, minimum wage, gun control and foreign policy ahead of the New York primary.
There will be 95 delegates up for grabs for Republicans in New York, and 247 for the Democrats.
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