Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan (R) met with Pope Francis on Thursday and received "blessings on behalf of all cancer patients."

Hogan, 59, announced in June that he had been diagnosed with late stage 3 non-Hodgkin lymphoma , an aggressive form of lymph node cancer.

The first-term governor recently spent five days in the hospital , which caused him to miss Pope Francis' arrival at Joint Base Andrews on Tuesday. The pope has spent three days in Washington, D.C., and will visit New York City and Philadelphia later in the week.

Hogan has undergone numerous chemotherapy sessions, and last month he announced his cancer is almost gone.

Ninety-five percent is gone, disappeared, dead. I still have some remnants of the tumors, but its dead, he told The Washington Post .

According to the American Cancer Society, non-Hodgkin lymphoma is one of the most common cancers in the United States, accounting for about 4 percent of all cancer cases.