Pope Leo made several anti-war statements. President Trump is in the middle of an altercation with Iran and took the statements personally. Ipso facto, President Trump made an anti-Pope Leo statement.
Many, many people had plenty to say on the matter, obviously. Two of the world’s most important men were feuding on the world stage. I drank my morning coffee and read through dozens of takes on X. I came across Bishop Barron’s post on the matter. It was measured and prudent, as his takes generally are. Not surprising at all, it was biased in the direction of his boss, il Papa.
“The statements made by President Trump on Truth Social regarding the Pope were entirely inappropriate and disrespectful. They don’t contribute at all to a constructive conversation. It is the Pope’s prerogative to articulate Catholic doctrine and the principles that govern the moral life. In regard to the concrete application of those principles, people of good will can and do disagree.” Which was all fine. I didn’t expect him to defend Trump’s statement. He went on to suggest Catholics close to Trump should try to arrange an in-person dialogue between the president and the pope and then he thanked the president for his defense of religious liberty.
His last sentence, however, gave me pause. “All that said,” he wrote, “I think the President owes the Pope an apology.”
It gave me pause because it sounded like something one might say if this situation were entirely temporal. But the Pope –the Vicar of Christ– was involved. So, shouldn’t it be playing out different than a normal, everyday dust up on social media between two world leaders?
I ask this because Catholics should not be behaving in the same ways that everyone else in the world behaves. And I thought of this, specifically, after reading Bishop Barron’s post because he was the one that taught me that Catholics should not be behaving in the same ways that everyone else in the world behaves.
Bishop Barron did a video series called “Catholicism” that led me to revert deeply back into my faith. In one of the videos, he discussed the concept of “turning the other cheek” and its Biblical meaning. He explained that in the culture of Jesus’s time, one would only use the right hand to strike someone since the left hand was considered unclean. Bishop Barron explained: “By turning the other cheek, one neither fights back directly nor flees but rather stands his ground and declares, ‘You will not treat me that way again.’
“It thereby effectively mirrors back to the aggressor his aggression. It is the declaration that the aggressed person refuses to cooperate with the world of the aggressor.”
Pope Leo responded to President Trump by saying he had no fear of the Trump administration nor of loudly proclaiming the Gospel message. “And that’s what I believe I am called to do,” he wrote, “And what the Church is called to do. We’re not politicians. We’re not looking to make foreign policy, as he calls it, with the same perspective that he might understand it. But I do believe that the message of the Gospel, ‘blessed are the peacemakers,’ is the message that the world needs to hear today.”
All of this sounds great. And here’s the thing: Pope Leo has a perfect opportunity to very publicly put the message of the Gospel into practice. This is an excellent opportunity for Pope Leo to turn the other cheek, reach out to Trump and show just how antithetical to the world Christ’s teachings really were and are.
The befuddlement, distress and shock that even the suggestion of Pope Leo peacemaking with President Trump would cause would be proof enough for me of its radically other-worldly approach. Our Lord sought to save the souls of prostitutes, tax collectors and murderers, but He must certainly draw the line at bombastic billionaires!
I’m reading the Brothers Karamozov and while this X back and forth was taking place, I was at the same time reading a scene in the book in which Fyodor Pavlovovich had caused much scandal at a monastery before the Father Superior. (Fyodor Pavlovovich could be likened to the type of person that many people perceive President Trump to be.) By his words and behavior, Fyodor had just embarrassed himself and pretty much anyone who had ever even been associated with him ever in his entire life including his entire ancestral line back to the dawn of time. The man was disgrace personified. The Father Superior, however, responded to it in such a bizarre way. Instead of telling Fyodor to leave or to demand an apology, he said instead, “Of old it was said: ‘And they began to speak against me many things and evil things. And I heard it and said within myself: this is the medicine of Jesus, which He has sent me to heal my vain soul.’ And therefore we, too, humbly thank you, our precious guest.” He then bowed deeply to Fyodor.
Fyodor responds to the gracious and patient superior by insulting him even more and then lying to which the Father Superior responds: “It is said, again: ‘Suffer with joy the dishonor which providentially befalleth thee, and be not troubled, neither hate him who dishonoreth thee.’ So shall we do.”
Did the Father Superior’s turn the other cheek response move Fyodor to repentance? No. But it certainly illustrated that the Father Superior was interested in dealing with Fyodor at a different level that is unusual in our world. His words sounded utterly alien as a reaction to Fyodor and had me contemplating from what place such incongruous words would come. Even if there was no effect on Fyodor, there might have been an effect on the people witnessing the interaction between Fyodor and the Father Superior.
This entire President Trump vs Pope Leo situation reminded me of a similar confrontation with President Trump back in his first term with another Catholic cleric. President Trump had plans to visit the Saint John Paul II shrine in Washington DC and the Archbishop of DC at the time responded by saying, “I find it baffling and reprehensible that any Catholic facility would allow itself to be so egregiously misused and manipulated in a fashion that violates our religious principles, which call us to defend the rights of all people even those with whom we might disagree.” What? So “our religious principles” are to defend the rights of all people, even those with whom we disagree and yet the Archbishop is wanting the right to visit a shrine to be denied to a person with whom he disagrees. Lol! It was a thoroughly partisan response and very in line with the usual back and forth in Washington politics.
To be Christian should be out of step with viewing people through the usual earthly lens. To be Christian is to think of President Trump in a way that –to our worldly sensibilities– is absurd. President Trump is a little lost sheep. Like all the rest of us, his heart yearns for Christ to leave the other 99 and to come find him. Put another way, President Trump is a part of that 1% that Christ will leave the other 99% to go find. It’s hard to think of Donald Trump as helpless in any way but in this regard, he is as helpless as the rest of us. Possibly even more so in that he is rich and Christ said it was very difficult for rich people to enter heaven.
It should have excited the Archbishop’s “religious principles” that a little lost sheep of Our Lord’s would be interested at all in a Catholic facility and he should have been out there –in the words of Pope Francis– “getting the smell of the sheep on him” to greet that little lost sheep that was President Trump in order to share the Good News of Christ Resurrected with him. What a missed opportunity to guide that camel through the eye of a needle!
But now the opportunity has presented itself again. Our Lord is “the Hound of Heaven” after all. He tirelessly pursues his dear little creatures (which seems like another outlandish way to picture Trump!). “Blessed are the peacemakers,” quoth Pope Leo and President Trump has given him such an ideal opening to give this oft quoted not oft attempted beatitude a try. He could start mustard seed small with proclaiming the Gospel. Refuse to cooperate with the world of the aggressor and make peace with President Trump.
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