President Joe Biden broke down in tears during a visit to Knock Shrine in Ireland on Friday when he met the chaplain who bestowed final rights on his late son Beau.
The emotional moment came when the president was given a tour of the Irish pilgrimage site after Biden learned that retired Army chaplain Father Frank O’Grady was now working there.
“He cried, it really hit him, and then we said a prayer, said a decade of the Rosary for his family,” Father Richard Gibbons said.
“He lit a candle and then he took a moment or two to pray,” Gibbons told the BBC.
President Joe Biden bows his head in front of a plaque with his son Beau’s name on it as he visits the Mayo Roscommon Hospice in Castlebar, County Mayo, Ireland. He was brought to tears minutes earlier while visiting Knock Shrine, Father Richard Gibbons said after encountering the chaplain who bestowed final rights on his late son Beau
“It just so happened that we have the chaplain working here at the shrine that gave his son the last rites, the last anointing, in the United States,” Gibbons told the broadcaster.
“He got the shock of his life coming to us, so it was a wonderful spontaneous thing that happened,” he said.
He said that when Biden found out he was there, he asked to meet the chaplain.
“He wanted to meet him immediately, he sent an intelligence agent to find him.
The emotional moment came during a visit where Biden placed his hand on the wall where witnesses claimed to have seen an apparition of the Virgin Mary in the 19th century.
Another event on Biden’s schedule already had a Beau connection: he later attended a hospice where a plaque honors his son, who died in 2015.
Biden’s Irish stay, which was an ongoing family gathering interspersed with speeches and meals with political leaders and local officials, took him to the Shrine of Our Lady Knock on the final day of his four-day trip.
There he stood in front of a huge mosaic depicting the apparition of Mary, together with an altar in the shape of a lamb and a cross. It was the most outward display of Biden’s Catholic faith on the trip to the land of many of his ancestors.
Father Richard Gibbons, the minister and rector, led him through the basilica’s shrine. He pointed out some artifacts and the Way of the Cross. The two shared a joke at the altar and laughed heartily.
President Joe Biden touches the original pediment of the church at Knock Shrine with Father Richard Gibbons in County Mayo, Ireland April 14, 2023. Biden visited the Shrine on the last day of his trip
And then the heavens opened just as they came out to see what was left of the old wall where the apparition is said to have appeared. Father Gibbons held an umbrella for the President.
They paused briefly at a square block of ancient stone so Biden could place his hand on the site of the church’s original pediment wall, as millions of pilgrims had done before him.
Biden’s sister Valerie Biden Owens and son Hunter, who have accompanied him at every key stop on the trip, were with him, and Biden’s son held an umbrella for his aunt.
It was in 1879 at the shrine site that witnesses said they saw the apparition, along with a vision of Joseph and St. John behind their church.
As with other tours of Ireland, crowds gathered to catch a glimpse of Biden and his motorcade. One had a sign that said “Welcome Home Joe.”
Biden landed at Knock Airport on Friday afternoon for a personal pilgrimage to County Mayo on the final day of his visit.
After locating some of his family’s Finnegan connections on the east side of the island in County Louth, he will visit the region that has family connections in the Blewitt branch of his family tree.
Brian and Father Richard laughed in front of the mural of the Epiphany
The skies opened up at one point during the visit, as it has for days
Crowds cheered the President as he drove through County Mayo, where he has roots
Former Vice President Mike Pence – a potential 2024 rival – has blasted his trip to an ancestral homeland of men in the face of the Pentagon security leak.
“Well I gotta tell you I’ve been to Ireland, it’s a beautiful place, my grandfather immigrated from Ireland,” Pence said in an interview from his home in Indiana on Friday.
“But with everything this country is dealing with: inflation at 40-year highs, Americans struggling, provocation in China, Russia on the rise in Eastern Europe, I don’t understand what a family holiday in Ireland seems to take precedence and this President isn’t doing a full blown press conference,” Pence added.
President Joe Biden boards Air Force One at the start of his last full day of activities in Ireland. He was joined by son Hunter Biden, sister Valerie Biden Owens and top aides
Biden will visit Knock Shrine, an Irish pilgrimage site visited by Pope John Paul II and Pope Francis, as well as Mother Teresa.
It is one of several stops where the President will revisit faith and family a day after addressing Ireland’s Parliament and speaking at a banquet.
According to the shrine, a heavenly apparition of Mary, the mother of Jesus, appeared there in 1879.
Biden, a practicing Catholic, arrived here on Tuesday not having time for services in his schedule.
According to local media, he is said to be praying there privately.
He then follows his ancestors again, this time with a visit to the North Mayo Heritage and Genealogical Center. Biden’s relatives from Blewitt come from the area.
As Biden mentioned throughout his trip, his great-great-great-grandfather, Edward Blewitt, was the town of Ballina for Scranton during the Great Famine.
Biden had a more secular day on Thursday as he addressed the Irish Parliament
Biden was invited to a banquet on the third day of his trip
Biden will speak outside St. Muredach’s Cathedral in Ballina, County Mayo, shortly before flying back to the United States
The President has distant relatives living in the area
Ballina residents prepare for Biden’s visit
It is Ballina that Biden and his advance team have chosen to deliver the closing speech on his trip. He has scheduled an evening sermon at St. Muredach’s Cathedral in County Mayo.
The picturesque setting of the Cathedral on the River Moy is certain.
Earlier in his day, which begins around noon, Biden plans a private visit to the Mayo Hospice, a center with a plaque bearing the name of his late son Beau, which Biden referred to during his speech to the Irish General Assembly on Thursday.
Biden broke ground there during a groundbreaking ceremony in 2017.
Following his speech, Biden returns to the US, although in his most recent declaration of love for Ireland during his address to the Irish Parliament, he declared “I’m home”.
But he’s not ready for the White House just yet. The President plans to spend the weekend at another of his homes: his beach house in Delaware.