(REUTERS) - Pope Francis on Saturday shared a meal with about 120 male and female inmates in a jail in Naples.

The pope was greeted with applause and chanting as he arrived for the lunch meeting.

The luncheon came during the pope's day-long trip to the southern Italian city.

Francis urged members of organised crime to turn away from violence and exploitation and stop the "tears of the mothers of Naples" after visiting one of the city's most violent and drug-infested neighbourhoods.

Since his election two years ago, Francis - who renounced the spacious papal apartments used by his predecessors and lives in a small apartment in a Vatican guest house - has made the defence of the poor and weakest members of society a key plank of his papacy.