Biden visit – latest: US president wraps up Ireland tour after tearful meeting with priest

US president Joe Biden has toured a Catholic pilgrimage site as part of his final day of engagements in Ireland.

Mr Biden was met by cheering crowds waving Ireland, US and Mayo flags, at Knock shrine in Co Mayo - one sign in the crowd read “Welcome Home Joe”.

Knock shrine is a Catholic pilgrimage site, where locals claimed to have seen an apparition of the Virgin Mary in 1879.

Mr Biden was given a tour of the basilica by the Knock parish priest, Father Richard Gibbons. The two could be seen laughing together by the altar as Fr Gibbons told the president about the history of the site, pointing out details including the Stations of the Cross.

Mr Biden is the second Catholic president and has been known to attend Holy Trinity Catholic Church in Washington’s Georgetown neighbourhood, a few miles from the White House.

It is where the nation’s first Catholic president, John F Kennedy, also attended mass in his time in office.

President Joe Biden has broken down in tears at Knock Shrine in Co Mayo after a chance meeting with the priest who performed the last rites sacrament on his son Beau Biden, who died of brain cancer in 2015.

The parish priest of Knock, Fr Richard Gibbons, told the BBC that the chaplain who gave the last rites to the president’s son is now working at Knock shrine.

Fr Frank O’Grady was the priest that performed the last rites and met with Mr Biden.

“He spoke about his, his family and his connection with his faith, and also about his son Beau who died,” Fr Gibbons said.

“And it just so happened, and this was kind of spontaneous, it just so happened that we have, working at the shrine here, the chaplain who gives the last rites of the last anointing to his son in the United States.

“Just extraordinary, and I didn’t even know that, I didn’t know that until the president arrived.

“I told the president that because I would have lined up the priests to meet him, so he wanted to meet him straightaway.”

Father Richard Gibbons, the parish priest of Knock, has described Joe Biden’s chance meeting with the priest who performed the last rites sacrament on his late son as an “emotional moment.”

Joe Biden’s son, Beau Biden, died of cancer in 2015. Father Frank O’Grady was the priest that performed the last rites and met with Mr Biden on Friday afternoon.

Fr Gibbons said: “He laughed, he cried, it just kind of hit the man, you could just (see) how deeply it all felt and meant to him.”

“It was an extraordinary afternoon. I won’t forget it, I can tell you that it was quite something else”, he added.

US President Joe Biden has been gifted an original piece of stone from the apparition wall at Knock Shrine after an emotional meeting with the priest who performed the last rites on his son Beau Biden.

The parish priest of Knock Fr Richard Gibbons said he was unaware that one of the priests working at Knock Shrine, Fr Frank O’Grady, had a personal connection to the president.

He told the BBC that as soon as the president heard Fr O’Grady was working in Knock he wanted to meet him immediately.

“So he dispatched a Secret Service agent to go and find him, I had his number so I contacted him immediately,” Fr Gibbons said.

“And he got the shock of his life to come over, you know, so that was a wonderful, spontaneous thing that happened.”

Father Richard Gibbons, the parish priest of Knock, said he would have arranged to have Fr Frank O’Grady in the line-up to meet the US president if he had known he had performed the last rites on his son Beau Biden.

“I asked, I said to Fr Frank O’Grady, ‘Why didn’t you tell me this when he came?’ And he said, ‘Well, I didn’t want to say too much about it’,” Fr Gibbons said.

Fr Gibbons also said Joe Biden had a private moment of prayer before receiving a gift from the site of the apparition of the Virgin Mary in 1879.

“We said a prayer, we said a decade of the rosary for his family and we lit a candle and then he took a moment or two of private prayer and then we presented him with a gift of some of the original stone of the gable wall where the apparition took place,” he said.

U.S. President Joe Biden broke down in tears after a chance meeting at an Irish church with the priest who performed the last rites on his son Beau, a priest who accompanied Biden during the visit said.

Father Richard Gibbons, who led Biden on a tour of the Catholic shrine of Knock, said he had not known that one of his colleagues, ex-US Army chaplain Father Frank O’Grady, had performed the sacrament until the president arrived.

Beau Biden, the president’s eldest son, died in the United States in 2015 from brain cancer.

“It just so happened, and this is spontaneous, that we have working at the shrine here the chaplain who gave the last rites, the last anointing, to his son in the United States,” Gibbons told the BBC.

“He (President Biden) wanted to meet him straight away, he dispatched a secret service agent to go and find him. He was crying, it really affected him and then we said a prayer, we said a decade of the rosary for his family, lit a candle and he took a moment or two of private prayer.”

“He laughed, he cried and it just kind of hit the man. You could just see how deeply it all felt and meant to him. It was an extraordinary afternoon.”

Biden, who is wrapping up a three-day trip to Ireland, later visited a nearby County Mayo hospice where he broke ground at its construction in 2017. A plaque on the ground at the entrance to the hospice is dedicated to Beau Biden.

The president, a devout Catholic, took a moment to look at the plaque before entering the hospice to meet the staff.

President Joe Biden’s public appearance for a speech in Ballina has been hailed as a “momentous occasion” and a “historic day” for the Mayo town.

Some of those gathered in an area directly in front of the stage told of their excitement at being so close to the US leader for the address.

Sinead Caffrey Blaine told the PA news agency: “I think it’s a very momentous occasion. It’s not often an American president visits the country, never mind our county.”

The 50-year-old Ballina local, who has been in position since shortly after 5pm, answered a resounding “yes” when asked if it was worth the wait even if it rained.

“From this spot? Definitely,” she added.

Alongside her was Mayo county councillor Donna Sheridan, who said: “I think it’s a really historic day for Ballina and for Mayo as a whole and I think it’s wonderful that President Biden is highlighting the beauty of our county across the world and promoting Mayo.”

The public event for US President Joe Biden’s visit to Ballina, Co Mayo, is under way.

Opening the proceedings, Irish band The Academic played their hit song Why Can’t We Be Friends?

People gathered in the audience danced and took selfies.

There will be more musical performances ahead of the arrival of Mr Biden.

Mayo TD Rose Conway-Walsh compared the occasion to an All-Ireland final, as Ballina prepared for Joe Biden’s final public address.

“There is a great sense of occasion here, there is great anticipation building for President Biden,” the Sinn Fein TD said.

“The eyes of the world are on Mayo and on Ballina tonight and I think the river, the cathedral, lends itself to something really special.”

Asked whether Mr Biden’s visit could bring some good luck to the Mayo GAA team, she said: “We are hoping.”

She said the event reminded her of an All-Ireland GAA final.

“It is that sense of anticipation when you’re going into Croke Park, that you’re expecting something good.”

Joe Biden has arrived at the North Mayo Heritage Centre, and was greeted by cheering crowds as his motorcade drove past.

The official US president’s helicopter, Marine One, set down on a landing zone just after 6pm, before Mr Biden travelled to the centre to be briefed on his family’s genealogy.