Obama Meets With Catholic Press Ahead of Vatican Visit

Yesterday President Barack Obama met with eight members of the Catholic press ahead of his planned meeting with Pope Benedict XVI next Friday. Obama will be in Italy for the Group of Eight meeting after visiting Russia earlier in the week. (AFP report on trip.) Obama opened the White House meeting with media with a statement and then answered questions from each reporter. The National Catholic Register has a series of reports on questions asked. Most attention has been given to Obama's statement that "there will be a robust conscience clause in place" when the White House finishes its review of HHS regulations that were put in place at the end of the Bush administration. Obama promised that the conscience protections will not be weaker than those that were in place before the Bush changes. The President also responded to questions on abortion rights, tensions between liberal and conservative Catholics, his own choice of a new church, homosexual rights, and the Middle East.