Pope Francis is the first pope to address a joint meeting of Congress and will finish his tour of Washington later today before traveling to New York City. (Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)

Pope Francis will be addressing Congress this morning in a historic moment for Catholics in America. He will be the first pope to do so. Speaker of the House John Boehner, a Catholic himself, invited the pope to speak. (Update: We’ve included a full video of the speech and link to the text below.)

“When you grow up Catholic, you learn about the pope as a distant figure, closer to God than any of us,” Boehner told the Washington Post. “To have him here, at our Capitol, among our people, is a once-in-a-lifetime moment, a glimpse of grace.”

He is scheduled to speak at 10 a.m. After the pope speaks in the House Chamber, he is scheduled to appear on the balcony of the Capitol’s West Front above a crowd of up to 50,000. Two hours before his address, there was already a pretty big crowd gathered on the Mall:

It’s Pope Francis’ third day in D.C. So far he’s blessed a lot of things, canonized a controversial saint and performed at least one miracle.

Update: The prepared remarks were released by the Holy See Press Office. And here’s a full video of his speech:

And here were some of the highlights:

Pope Francis told the Chambers that he wanted to speak to the American public—“the land of the free and the home of the brave”—through speaking to them: “I would like to take this opportunity to dialogue with the many thousands of men and women, who strive each day to do a honest day’s work, to bring home their daily bread, to save money to build a better life for their families. These are men and women who are not concerned simply with paying taxes but in their own quiet way sustain the life of society.”

He spoke out against fundamentalism “whether religious or of any other kind”: “A delicate balance is required to combat violence perpetrated in the name of a religion, an ideology or an economic system.” He said, “Our response must instead be one of hope & healing, of peace and & justice.”

His remarks on our country’s immigrant roots got a big round of applause: “In recent centuries, millions of people came to this land to pursue their dream of building a future in freedom. We, the people of this continent, are not fearful of foreigners, because most of us were once foreigners.”

Both Boehner and Biden were tearing up:

The Pope threw a very Catholic curveball. He got a big round of applause for what sounded like coded anti-abortion language (which it was): “our responsibility to protect and defend human life at every stage of its development.” But then his next line got a more muted response: “This conviction has led me, from the beginning of my ministry, to advocate at different levels for the global abolition of the death penalty.” (The Associated Press notes this is not a popular position among the American public.)

The Pope once again stumped for a more robust response to climate change: “I call for a courageous and responsible effort to ‘redirect our steps’ and to avert the most serious effects of the environmental deterioration caused by human activity.”

He asked Congress to stop the arms trade:

Why are deadly weapons being sold to those who plan to inflict untold suffering on individuals and society? Sadly, the answer, as we all know, is simply for money: money that is drenched in blood, often innocent blood. In the face of this shameful and culpable silence, it is our duty to confront the problem and to stop the arms trade.

He closed referencing the stories of four Americans whose stories and beliefs he wove throughout his speech: Abraham Lincoln, Martin Luther King, Dorothy Day and Thomas Merton:

In these remarks I have sought to present some of the richness of your cultural heritage, of the spirit of the American people. It is my desire that this spirit continue to develop and grow, so that as many young people as possible can inherit and dwell in a land which has inspired so many people to dream.

God bless America!