As millions of people in the United States are receiving their third dose of high-quality vaccines, some citizens abroad have yet to get their first. And months of pleading from the expats and their advocates, who represent as many as 9 million Americans overseas, has produced no change in policy.

Even as the pontiff appealed for changes of migrant policy and of heart in his remarks to the public in St. Peter's Square, hundreds of migrants were either at sea in the central Mediterranean awaiting a port after rescue or recently coming ashore in Sicily or the Italian mainland after setting sail from Libya or Turkey, according to authorities.