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Pope Leo XVI waves to the crowd gathered at St. Peter\u2019s Basilica following his selection as pope in 2025. (Photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons)<\/p>\n
Verbally attacking the spiritual leader of roughly 1.4 billion people is not a good idea, especially if you\u2019re a morally bankrupt felon and alleged pedophile. But Donald Trump cannot seem to help himself. Thus, we come to the story of a pope, a president and a one-sided fight.<\/p>\n
Trump destroys everything he touches, has alienated nearly every ally the U.S. once had and is rapidly running the U.S. economy into the ground. Then, he decides to alienate American Catholics, who were already upset by his blasphemous AI post depicting himself as Christ and an earlier a post of himself as pope.<\/p>\n
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Trump\u2019s AI post of himself as a pope was ill-conceived. He also made an error in judgment when he challenged Pope Leo to a one-sided fight. (Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons)<\/p>\n
Soon after Trump began his verbal assault against the pope, CNN posted a story about a possible motive for Trump\u2019s one-sided fight, and it\u2019s a good theory.<\/p>\n
In a poll conducted by Hart Research Associates\/Public Opinion Strategies in late February-early March, American voters were surveyed to determine how they feel about various public figures such as Trump, Pope Leo, Vice President JD Vance, Gov. Gavin Newsom (D-CA), late-night talk show host Stephen Colbert and others. The survey also looked at people\u2019s opinions about organizations such as the Democratic and Republican parties and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).<\/p>\n
Pope Leo XIV received the highest percentage of positive responses at 42 percent. Trump\u2019s TV nemesis, late-night talk show host Stephen Colbert, had the second highest rating. Trump had the third highest negative rating at 53 percent. Only ICE (56 percent) and Iran (61 percent) had lower ratings. In comparison, the pope had an extremely low negative response at 8 percent, according to the poll.<\/p>\n
The survey was conducted before Trump attacked Iran, posted the AI image of himself as Christ, and raged at the pope when the pope criticized American immigration and foreign policies. Even without those factors, the pope trounced Trump.<\/p>\n
Popes have a duty to speak out against actions that fly in the face of Christ\u2019s teachings. War and mistreating immigrants fall into that category.<\/p>\n
Pope Leo XIV responded to Trump\u2019s one-sided fight with a statement worthy of a pope. \u201cI don\u2019t want to get into a debate with him. I don\u2019t believe the message of the gospel is meant to be abused in the way some people are doing, and I will continue to speak out\u2026.\u201d<\/p>\n
Vance and House speaker Mike Johnson then jumped to Trump\u2019s defense, but it was clear that none of these three men could match Pope Leo\u2019s intelligence or class.<\/p>\n
Many posts on Facebook praised Pope Leo. \u201cWell\u2026 the Pope has standards! He knows not to debate fools,\u201d one person wrote on Facebook. \u201cAs an American, can the Pope run for President of the United States under the Democratic party in 2028?\u201d another asked. One person had this to say: \u201cLeo is My Pope! Having an American Pope is a game changer! I\u2019m enjoying & btw, I\u2019m Jewish!\u201d<\/p>\n
Yet another said, \u201cHe is so intelligent and knowledgeable and very sincere, if we all opened our eyes and hearts we would pray for peace. Just imagine if there was no hate, the world would be a much better place. Just try it for one day.\u201d<\/p>\n
Within the past month, Trump has been busy with issues other than his one-sided fight with the pope\u2026<\/p>\n
Some Trump supporters have said their hero crossed the line when he threatened to commit genocide, while others cited his blasphemous AI post of himself as Christ as the final straw. But quite a few cited rising gas prices rather than any number of truly terrible things Trump has done to hurt people.<\/p>\n
For me, Trump crossed the line prior to the 2016 presidential election when he ridiculed a disabled reporter. It was cruel, deeming and totally inappropriate. That one incident told me all I needed to know about Donald Trump.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe more Trump and these forces reveal themselves for what they are, the more that decent people \u2013 whether they call themselves Republican or Democrat, conservative or progressive, right or left, American or non-American \u2013 are recoiling from them,\u201d according to former U.S. secretary of labor Robert Reich. Like the pope, Reich<\/a>, a professor of public policy at Berkeley, has been highly critical of Trump\u2019s illegal war.<\/p>\n Yet, the former labor secretary is hopeful. \u201cWe are starting to win because Trump and the forces he unleashed are so deeply repulsive to the consciences of most Americans and much of the rest of humanity,\u201d Reich said in an article on AlterNet, a progressive online news magazine.<\/p>\n Pope Leo\u2019s reminders about morality are desperately needed. Some Americans have not been able tell the difference between right and wrong despite claiming to be Christians. It apparently didn\u2019t bother many of them that Trump said he could \u201cdo anything\u201d to women because he was a \u201cstar.\u201d \u201cGrab \u2018em by the p***y. You can do anything,\u201d he said on an infamous tape. (He\u2019s completely wrong on that point.)<\/p>\n And a number of Trump supporters have compared Trump to God. The White House faith leader Paula White-Cain committed blasphemy when she said that saying \u201cno\u201d to Trump was like saying \u201cno\u201d to God. A right-wing lawyer who represented several of the Jan. 6 insurrectionists once tweeted, \u201cAs Christ was crucified, and then rose again on the 3rd<\/sup> day, so too will Donald Trump.\u201d<\/p>\n Trump also compared himself to Christ on April 1, when he said, \u201cOn Palm Sunday, Jesus entered Jerusalem as crowds welcomed him with praise honoring him as king. They call me king now. Can you believe it?\u201d (No, I can\u2019t. I have never<\/u> heard anyone<\/u> call Donald Trump a king. \u2013 GB)\u00a0 <\/em><\/p>\n Fellow Patheos contributor Rebecca Hamilton made a more appropriate comparison when she likened Trump to an angry copperhead snake.<\/a>. She also assessed American society quite well when she said, \u201cWe may go to church, but our values are essentially Anti-Christ\u201d in her Patheos article,<\/a> You Cannot Follow Both Jesus Christ and Donald Trump.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n Hamilton is a Catholic who contributes to Patheos. I\u2019m a lifelong Protestant, and I think her articles are spot on.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Pope Leo XVI waves to the crowd gathered at St. Peter\u2019s Basilica following his selection as pope in 2025. (Photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons) Another Poor Decision by Donald Trump Verbally attacking the spiritual leader of roughly 1.4 billion people is not a good idea, especially if you\u2019re a morally bankrupt felon and alleged pedophile. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4662,"featured_media":7853,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2408],"tags":[2105,2414,2411,2420,2417],"class_list":["post-7850","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-pope-and-president","tag-donald-trump","tag-pope","tag-pope-leo","tag-trump-attack","tag-us-president"],"yoast_head":"\nTrump\u2019s God Complex<\/strong><\/h3>\n
A Better Comparison<\/strong><\/h3>\n