Pope Leo: I am not afraid of Trump administration

U.S.-born Pope Leo XIV pushed back Mon­day on Pres­i­dent Don­ald Trump’s broad­side against him over the U.S.-Is­rael war in Iran, telling re­porters that the Vat­i­can’s ap­peals for peace and rec­on­cil­i­a­tion are root­ed in the Gospel, and that he doesn’t fear the Trump ad­min­is­tra­tion.

“To put my mes­sage on the same plane as what the pres­i­dent has at­tempt­ed to do here, I think is not un­der­stand­ing what the mes­sage of the Gospel is,” Leo told The As­so­ci­at­ed Press aboard the pa­pal plane en route to Al­ge­ria. “And I’m sor­ry to hear that but I will con­tin­ue on what I be­lieve is the mis­sion of the church in the world to­day.”

His­to­ry’s first U.S.-born pope stressed that he was not mak­ing a di­rect at­tack against Trump or any­one else with his gen­er­al ap­peal for peace and crit­i­cisms of the “delu­sion of om­nipo­tence” that is fu­el­ing the Iran war and oth­er con­flicts around the world.

“I will not en­ter in­to de­bate. The things that I say are cer­tain­ly not meant as at­tacks on any­one. The mes­sage of the Gospel is very clear: ‘Blessed are the peace­mak­ers,’” Leo said.

“I will not shy away from an­nounc­ing the mes­sage of the Gospel and invit­ing all peo­ple to look for ways of build­ing bridges of peace and rec­on­cil­i­a­tion, and look­ing for ways to avoid war any time that’s pos­si­ble.”

Speak­ing to oth­er re­porters, he added: “I’m not afraid of the Trump ad­min­is­tra­tion or of speak­ing out loud­ly about the mes­sage of the Gospel, which is what the Church works for.’'

“We are not politi­cians. We do not look at for­eign pol­i­cy from the same per­spec­tive that he may have,’' the pope said, adding, ”I will con­tin­ue to speak out strong­ly against war, seek­ing to pro­mote peace, pro­mot­ing di­a­logue and mul­ti­lat­er­al­ism among states to find so­lu­tions to prob­lems.

“Too many peo­ple are suf­fer­ing to­day, too many in­no­cent peo­ple have been killed, and I be­lieve some­one must stand up and say that there is a bet­ter way,’' he said.

Trump says Leo is not ‘do­ing a very good job’

Trump de­liv­ered an ex­tra­or­di­nary broad­side against Leo on Sun­day night, say­ing he didn’t think the U.S.-born glob­al leader of the Catholic Church is “do­ing a very good job” and that “he’s a very lib­er­al per­son,” while al­so sug­gest­ing the pon­tiff should “stop cater­ing to the Rad­i­cal Left.”

Fly­ing back to Wash­ing­ton from Flori­da, Trump used a lengthy so­cial me­dia post to sharply crit­i­cize Leo, then kept it up af­ter de­plan­ing, in com­ments on the tar­mac to re­porters.

“I’m not a fan of Pope Leo,” he said.

Trump’s com­ments came af­ter Leo sug­gest­ed over the week­end that a “delu­sion of om­nipo­tence” is fu­el­ing the U.S.-Is­rael war in Iran. While it’s not un­usu­al for popes and pres­i­dents to be at cross pur­pos­es, it’s ex­ceed­ing­ly rare for the pope to di­rect­ly crit­i­cize a U.S. leader — and Trump’s sting­ing re­sponse is equal­ly un­com­mon, if not more so.

“Pope Leo is WEAK on Crime, and ter­ri­ble for For­eign Pol­i­cy,” the pres­i­dent wrote in his post, adding, “I don’t want a Pope who thinks it’s OK for Iran to have a Nu­clear Weapon.”

Ital­ian politi­cians across the spec­trum showed their sol­i­dar­i­ty with Leo. Pre­mier Gior­gia Mel­oni sent a mes­sage of sup­port for his peace mis­sion while the leader of the main op­po­si­tion par­ty, El­ly Schlein, was more di­rect, call­ing Trump’s at­tacks “ex­treme­ly se­ri­ous.”

Trump re­peat­ed that sen­ti­ment in com­ments to re­porters, say­ing, “We don’t like a pope who says it’s OK to have a nu­clear weapon.”

Lat­er, Trump post­ed a pic­ture sug­gest­ing he had saint-like pow­ers akin to those of Je­sus Christ. Wear­ing a bib­li­cal-style robe, Trump is seen lay­ing hands on a bedrid­den man as light em­anates from his fin­gers, while a sol­dier, a nurse, a pray­ing woman and a beard­ed man in a base­ball cap all look on ad­mir­ing­ly. The sky above is filled with ea­gles, an Amer­i­can flag and va­porous im­ages.

Leo’s op­po­si­tion to war irked Trump

All of that came af­ter Leo presided over an evening prayer ser­vice in St. Pe­ter’s Basil­i­ca on Sat­ur­day, the same day the Unit­ed States and Iran be­gan face-to-face ne­go­ti­a­tions in Pak­istan dur­ing a frag­ile cease­fire, with Vice Pres­i­dent JD Vance lead­ing the U.S. del­e­ga­tion. Vance is Catholic and re­cent­ly re­leased a book about his faith.

Dur­ing his evening prayer ser­vice, the pope didn’t men­tion the Unit­ed States or Trump by name, but his tone and mes­sage ap­peared di­rect­ed at Trump and U.S. of­fi­cials, who have boast­ed of U.S. mil­i­tary su­pe­ri­or­i­ty and jus­ti­fied the war in re­li­gious terms.

Leo, who is on an 11-day trip to Africa start­ing Mon­day — has pre­vi­ous­ly said that God “does not lis­ten to the prayers of those who wage war, but re­jects them.” He’s al­so ref­er­enced an Old Tes­ta­ment pas­sage from Isa­iah, say­ing that “even though you make many prayers, I will not lis­ten — your hands are full of blood.”

Be­fore the cease­fire, when Trump warned of mass strikes against Iran­ian pow­er plants and oth­er in­fra­struc­ture and that “an en­tire civ­i­liza­tion will die tonight,” Leo de­scribed such sen­ti­ments as “tru­ly un­ac­cept­able.”

In his so­cial me­dia post on Sun­day night, how­ev­er, Trump went far be­yond the war in Iran in crit­i­ciz­ing Leo.

The pres­i­dent wrote, “I don’t want a Pope who thinks it’s ter­ri­ble that Amer­i­ca at­tacked Venezuela, a Coun­try that was send­ing mas­sive amounts of Drugs in­to the Unit­ed States.” That was a ref­er­ence to the Trump ad­min­is­tra­tion hav­ing oust­ed Venezue­lan Pres­i­dent Nicolás Maduro in Jan­u­ary.

“I don’t want a Pope who crit­i­cizes the Pres­i­dent of the Unit­ed States be­cause I’m do­ing ex­act­ly what I was elect­ed, IN A LAND­SLIDE, to do,” Trump added, ref­er­enc­ing his 2024 elec­tion vic­to­ry.

He al­so sug­gest­ed in the post that Leo on­ly got his po­si­tion “be­cause he was an Amer­i­can, and they thought that would be the best way to deal with Pres­i­dent Don­ald J. Trump.”

“If I wasn’t in the White House, Leo wouldn’t be in the Vat­i­can,” Trump wrote, adding, “Leo should get his act to­geth­er as Pope, use Com­mon Sense, stop cater­ing to the Rad­i­cal Left, and fo­cus on be­ing a Great Pope, not a Politi­cian. It’s hurt­ing him very bad­ly and, more im­por­tant­ly, it’s hurt­ing the Catholic Church!”

In his sub­se­quent com­ments to re­porters, Trump re­mained high­ly crit­i­cal, say­ing of Leo, “I don’t think he’s do­ing a very good job. He likes crime I guess” and adding, “He’s a very lib­er­al per­son.”

Bish­ops say the pope is not a politi­cian

Arch­bish­op Paul S. Coak­ley, pres­i­dent of the U.S. Con­fer­ence of Catholic Bish­ops, is­sued a state­ment say­ing he was “dis­heart­ened” by Trump’s com­ments.

“Pope Leo is not his ri­val; nor is the Pope a politi­cian. He is the Vic­ar of Christ who speaks from the truth of the Gospel and for the care of souls,” Coak­ley said.

The Ital­ian Bish­ops’ Con­fer­ence ex­pressed re­gret over Trump’s words, and un­der­lined that the pope “is not a po­lit­i­cal coun­ter­part, but the suc­ces­sor of Pe­ter, called to serve the Gospel, truth and peace.’'

In the 2024 elec­tion, Trump won 55% of Catholic vot­ers, ac­cord­ing to AP Vote­Cast, an ex­ten­sive sur­vey of the elec­torate. But Trump’s ad­min­is­tra­tion al­so has close ties to con­ser­v­a­tive evan­gel­i­cal Protes­tant lead­ers and has claimed heav­en­ly en­dorse­ment for the war on Iran.

De­fense Sec­re­tary Pe­te Hegseth urged Amer­i­cans to pray for vic­to­ry “in the name of Je­sus Christ.” And, when Trump was asked whether he thought God ap­proved of the war, he said, “I do, be­cause God is good — be­cause God is good and God wants to see peo­ple tak­en care of.”

Win­field re­port­ed from aboard the pa­pal plane.

By WILL WEIS­SERT, JOSH BOAK and NICOLE WIN­FIELD

ABOARD THE PA­PAL PLANE (AP)