This was a human body placed on an altar with candles lit around it in a last minute attempt to rally votes for Donald Trump — all orchestrated by a Roman Catholic priest.
There is a dark and macabre sacramental inversion in this. It would not be crazy to call it demonic. Nor would it be theologically out of line to see Fr. Pavone as another demonic example of the line of cultural warrior priests that includes Maciel and Corapi. I stake my own theological mandatum on this.
Furthermore, this is a literal example of a Catholic priest making an offering to the idol of Donald Trump. Fr. Pavone used the ancient Hebrew ritual and Christian sacramental heritage, the imaginary of the source and summit of the Catholic faith, to display a naked, dead body of a human being as a way to dramatize the need to vote for Donald Trump in the last days of the US election season.
“By their fruits you shall know them.”