The president and the pope met privately at the Vatican on Wednesday, "setting aside their previous clashes to broadcast a tone of peace for an audience around the globe," as The Associated Press puts it.
Recently, the pope and Trump have been in agreement on a need for Muslim leaders to do more against extremists in their own communities. But "there are few other areas where their views align," AP notes.
The pope said during the presidential campaign last year that a man who thinks about building walls and not bridges is "not Christian,” in response to Trump's pledge to build a wall along the U.S. border with Mexico.
Trump said it was "disgraceful" that the Argentine-born pope, who represents just over half of the world's two billion Christians, questioned his faith.
"If and when the Vatican is attacked by ISIS, which as everyone knows is ISIS' ultimate trophy, I can promise you that the pope would have only wished and prayed that Donald Trump would have been president," Trump said back then.
Part of Trump's motivation in meeting with the pope was to dramatize how the three major religions should rally against the threat from Islamist militants, says Reuters.
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