Vatican City, June 5 (RHC)-- At the Vatican, Pope Francis had a message for the American people.  He said: "I have witnessed with great concern the disturbing social unrest in your nation in these past days, following the tragic death of Mr. George Floyd.  My friends, we cannot tolerate or turn a blind eye to racism and exclusion in any form, and yet claim to defend the sacredness of every human life.”

Pope Francis’s remarks came a day after President Trump visited the Saint John Paul II National Shrine on Tuesday, which Washington Archbishop Wilton Gregory called a “baffling and reprehensible” politicized photo op.  Gregory is the first African American archbishop of the Archdiocese of Washington, D.C.