Catholic groups rebel against Trump over messianic imagery and attacks on the pope

With the embers of the scandal surrounding the publication and subsequent deletion of an image of himself depicted as Jesus Christ still glowing, U.S. President Donald Trump once again engaged in blasphemous provocation on Wednesday. On his social media platform, Truth, he shared a post from a user named X featuring a drawing of Jesus embracing the president, who appears to be in a state of profound contemplation. The post originated from an account called Irish for Trump, apparently owned by a Republican candidate from Massachusetts who failed to advance past the 2024 primaries. Trump accompanied it with the following message: “The Radical Left Lunatics might not like this, but I think it is quite nice!!!”

The truth is that since he attacked Pope Leo XIV last Sunday for his criticism of the U.S.-Israeli war against Iran and then released an AI-generated creation in which appeared healing a sick person dressed in a white robe, touched by an aura and surrounded by angels and fighter jets, disgust has spread far beyond that “Radical Left” he enjoys blaming.

Criticism has been pouring in against Trump in recent days — unusually for him, he deleted the post the following day and said he had shared it because it portrayed him as a “doctor” and not as the son of God — from within his own ranks. This includes prominent Republican politicians, who are not usually inclined to confront him, religious leaders and a segment of his Christian base, especially Catholics.

Several bishops, from Oklahoma to Chicago and Las Vegas, spoke out publicly against the attacks against Leo XIV. Archbishop Paul Coakley, president of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, stated in a press release that “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.”

“I’m not saying Trump is the Antichrist, but there’s no doubt he’s radiating the spirit of the Antichrist,” Rod Dreher, a conservative commentator and Orthodox Christian, told The Wall Street Journal. The comment referred to a rhetoric that has gained unprecedented traction in the United States thanks to Peter Thiel’s obsession with the Antichrist. Thiel, founder of PayPal and Palantir, is also a mentor to Vice President J.D. Vance, whose conversion to Catholicism he helped to bring about. Meanwhile, former college swimmer and anti-trans activist Riley Gaines warned on social media that “God shall not be mocked.”

With his conservative ideology and his relentless war against the progressive “woke” agenda, as well as against abortion rights and the gains of the trans community, Trump has won the support of both voter bases in the last three elections. In 2024, he was supported by 62% of Protestants and 55% of Catholics, according to the Pew Center.

The first American pope

That was months before the election of Leo XIV. Born in Chicago, he is the first American pope in history and is more popular among conservative Catholics in the U.S. than his predecessor, Francis, whose pontificate was marked by clashes with an American Church in crisis due to the pedophilia scandals within its ranks. Trump also attacked Jorge Mario Bergoglio during his first term, but none of those attacks can compare to the one launched last weekend by the U.S. president against his compatriot.

He said he is not “a big fan” of the Pope, whom he criticized for being “soft on crime” and playing into the hands of the left. Leo XIV, on a papal trip to Africa, responded forcefully on Monday: “I have no fear of the Trump administration,” he declared. On Tuesday night, the Republican returned to the attack on Truth with this message: “Will someone please tell Pope Leo that Iran has killed at least 42,000 innocent, completely unarmed, protesters in the last two months, and that for Iran to have a Nuclear Bomb is absolutely unacceptable.”

Shortly before the publication of that message, Vance, the most politically powerful Catholic in the country, participated in an event for Turning Point USA, the proselytizing MAGA organization founded on fervent Christian values ​​by Charlie Kirk, who was murdered last September. Vance was speaking about the pope, whom he advised to “be careful when he talks about matters of theology,” when an attendee in the audience interrupted him twice, shouting. This argument — that the pontiff would be better off not meddling in other people’s affairs or engaging in politics — has been repeated in recent days by several Republican politicians, with Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, a devout evangelical Christian, at the forefront.

This is not the first time the vice president has clashed with Robert Prevost, the pope’s baptismal name, who is listed in public records as a Republican voter. Vance, who was one of the last people to see Francis alive, having visited him at the Vatican, asserted last year on social media that the Catholic faith is compatible with the deportation of immigrants. Leo XIV responded by sharing an article that contradicted this theory, warning that his interpretation of love in Christianity, specifically the concept of ordo amoris, was “erroneous.”

A few months later, Trump, whose limited understanding of matters of faith has been further demonstrated by this scandal, resorted to artificial intelligence to portray himself as the pope. And anyone familiar with the wildly inventive and often vulgar and blasphemous world of MAGA merchandising — one of whose most repeated slogans is “Jesus is my savior, and Trump is my president” — will know that imagery depicting the Republican leader as a martyr or a divine figure is commonplace.

Trump is Protestant, like most of his predecessors in the White House. This is the norm in the United States, with a few exceptions, such as Joe Biden, who was the first Catholic president since John F. Kennedy.

A third of the current cabinet members are Catholic, as are 27% of the members of the House of Representatives and six of the nine Supreme Court justices (who, incidentally, are all conservatives). These three percentages far from accurately reflect the overall religious makeup of the country: Americans who identify as Catholic represent 20% of the population.

It would be premature to say, despite the criticism he’s received lately, that the scandal will ultimately harm Trump’s standing with this sector. His history is full of episodes capable of ending any other politician’s career, and yet they didn’t affect his. However, he is currently experiencing the lowest approval ratings of his second term.

Sign up for our weekly newsletter to get more English-language news coverage from EL PAÍS USA Edition