Bush treated to special audience with pope

0 Comments | AFP, June, 2008

VATICAN CITY (AFP) — US President George W. Bush was treated on Friday to a special audience with Pope Benedict XVI just two months after the White House laid on a lavish birthday party for the pontiff.

The two met in the Vatican's medieval Saint John's Tower and strolled through the secluded Vatican Gardens, a walled enclave that has been a place of quiet meditation for popes since the 13th century.

The "special protocol" -- papal audiences are normally held in the pontiff's private library -- was followed "to respond to the cordiality of the welcome received by the Supreme Pontiff" in April, the Vatican said.

The US leader, who took off for Paris shortly afterward, could be heard exclaiming "what an honour" as he clasped the pontiff's hands at the start of...