President attacks Pope over Iran war criticism, shares AI Jesus image
Updated ,first published
Moments after Donald Trump posted his rant about Pope Leo being “weak on crime” and “terrible on foreign policy,” he posted an AI image of Jesus Christ healing the sick, overlooked by the American flag, fighter jets and a bald eagle.
This was typical of the AI trend, which is regularly amplified by the president’s social media account. But if needed, it was a good reminder that there is a president and administration happy to take the lord’s name and image in vain while presenting themselves as men of God.
Trump not only disparaged Leo as a wannabe politician who needed to “pull himself together” and focus on his job, but also claimed that Leo was chosen as pope not because of any personal qualities, divine insight, or leadership qualities, but because the Vatican thought he could get along better with Trump.
“He wasn’t on any list to be pope, and he was put there by the Church because he was American, and they thought that would be the best way to deal with President Donald J. Trump,” the president said on Truth Social. “Leo wouldn’t be in the Vatican if I wasn’t in the White House.”
Commensurate with this level of narcissism, Leo is coping with this because he dares to publicly criticize Trump and the war against Iran.
The pope called Trump’s incendiary social media post threatening Iranian civilization “will die tonight” as “truly unacceptable.”
Then, at vespers in St. Peter’s Basilica at the Vatican, he condemned the Trump administration’s brash approach to the war and spoke of an “illusion of omnipotence” that was “becoming increasingly unpredictable and aggressive.”
“Enough worshiping yourself and money!” Leo said. “Enough of the show of force! Enough of the war!”
The pope is not the only senior Catholic to speak out. Three cardinals took the stage 60 Minutes On Sunday night (US time), he made harsh criticisms of the war as well as the Trump administration’s immigration and deportation policies, which Leo also condemned.
One of them, Cardinal Robert McElroy, archbishop of Washington, called the Iran war immoral and unnecessary in his speech at a rally for peace over the weekend. He called on his followers to oppose attempts to restart the conflict.
If Trump and his colleagues want to claim divine support, then they need to accept that the guardians of divine support stand down.
Cardinal Blase Cupich, Archbishop of Chicago, said it was “sickening” to see the White House gamify the war by posting videos on social media of the strike combined with clips from video games, among other criticisms of the war and the administration.
“We dehumanize the victims of war by turning human suffering, the killing of children and our own soldiers into entertainment,” Cupich said. 60 Minutes. “This is not who we are. We are better than this.”
The television program also featured Pope Leo’s remarks and would likely be the trigger for Trump’s incendiary social media post shortly thereafter.
In it, Trump branded the leader of the world’s 1.4 billion Catholics “weak on crime” and “terrible on foreign policy.” He said he doesn’t want a pope who thinks it’s okay for Iran to have nuclear weapons.
unprecedented tirade
The 79-year-old president accused Leo of serving the “radical left” and harming the Catholic Church and told him to focus on being a great pope, not a politician.
Trump wrote: “I don’t want a Pope who criticizes the President of the United States because I’m doing exactly what I was elected to do, hitting record lows in landslides, crime, and creating the greatest stock market in history.”
This is an unprecedented tirade by a sitting president about a sitting pope and would be impossible to imagine under any other U.S. leader.
Meanwhile, Leo’s anti-war and pro-immigrant views are hardly controversial for a man of the church. Although his predecessor, Pope Francis, also criticized Trump’s border policies, as the first American pope he may be more outspoken than others in expressing those views. War and immigration are exactly the issues on which a pope is expected to take a strong stance.
The president is particularly hostile to criticism from someone he believes owes him loyalty; He clearly thinks Leo does so as an American.
But Leo and the cardinals have no right to comment on Trump and his war in Iran; They have a duty to defend what they believe to be the word of God and the teachings of Jesus Christ.
And it is the Trump administration that is demanding some kind of divine approval for this war. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, in particular, has sometimes called the Iran war a holy war and asked Americans to pray for victory “in the name of Jesus Christ.”
During a service at the Pentagon last month, he prayed for, among other things, “a crushing act of violence against those who do not deserve mercy.” While talking about the rescue of a downed American airman in Iran during Easter, Hegseth compared him to Jesus.
“He was shot on a Friday, Good Friday. He hid in a cave, in a crevice, all Saturday. He was rescued on Sunday,” Hegseth said. “A pilot born again… a nation of joy. God is Good.”
Trump claims he was saved by God during an assassination attempt in Pennsylvania in 2024 to save the United States.
But if he and his colleagues want to claim that they have divine support, then they must accept that the divine guardians will step back.
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Michael Koziol is the North America correspondent for The Age and the Sydney Morning Herald. He is a former Sydney editor, Sun-Herald deputy editor and a federal political correspondent in Canberra.Connect with: X or email.
