The President and the Pope

One thing caught my attention in the midst of Donald Trump’s verbal feud with Robert Francis Prevost, otherwise known as Pope Leo the Fourteenth.  And that is an appearance on NewsNation’s “Cuomo” during which Chris Cuomo asked Bill O’Reilly who’s right.

Bill-O said: they both are. 

In his quest for peace, Pope Leo is taking the position of the Catholic Church, as he should.

Donald Trump, on the other hand, seems to have grown tired of a rogue nation that wants nuclear weapons and might use them, and that chants “Death to America” while wiping out thousands of its own people when they dare to protest.

Video:  Chris Cuomo and Bill O’Reilly on the President and the Pope

It seems to me that the Pope ought to pray for peace; that’s his job.  But does the Pope not understand what the war in Iran is about? Preventing Iran from having a nuclear weapon is all about peace in the Middle East.

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Trump is an unconventional president. 

Pope Leo XIV (Photo: Edgar Beltrán, The Pillar) Wikipedia Commons

To begin with, Trump identifies as Presbyterian, but Melania is a Roman Catholic – the first Catholic First Lady since Jacqueline Kennedy.  It would be interesting to hear her conversations with the POTUS about this issue, assuming they talk about it at all.  More interesting would be a sit-down between the President and the Pope.

Trump will go after anyone who is in the public eye and dares to disagree with him.  He’ll berate his detractors in speeches, at pressers, and on Truth Social.  But when he meets someone in person, such as Zohran Mamdani (the nutcase mayor of New York), Trump is subject to being charmed.

There is no reason, as Bill O’Reilly told Cuomo, to think that either of these men should oppose what the other is doing or saying.  It’s a matter of “blessed are the peacemakers” versus “this is the real world.”

If they were to get together, and talked it out in a calm way, they could better understand each other with no changing of minds necessary.

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Video:  Pope Leo XIV responds to Trump’s comments against him in feud over Iran war

Leo is both liberal and conservative.

I’ve called Pope Leo liberal on the radio.  And he has liberal leanings, as his predecessor often did.  But he’s not a total leftist.  A quick review of his positions on Wikipedia reveals that the Pope is a little bit left and a little bit right.  However, he has made it plain he does not approve of war:

Leo has consistently advocated against armed conflict. He denounced the Russian invasion of Ukraine, describing it as a “senseless war”, and appealing to Russian leaders to end the conflict. In one of his first major speeches as pope, Leo called for a ceasefire in the Gaza war. Following the Israeli strikes on Iran in June 2025, he urged Iranian and Israeli authorities to act with “reason”. He has issued prayers for those affected by the clashes in southern Syria and the 2025 Cambodia–Thailand clashes. He called for a ceasefire and humanitarian aid following the El Fasher massacre in Sudan. He has criticized the United States’ military strikes near Venezuela. Leo has also expressed concern regarding the intensification of violence in Syria and in Iran, calling for dialogue and peace.

He’s consistent, but seems to ignore the fact that in these wars, there is usually a bad guy – such as the drug lord that ran Venezuela or the ayatollahs than run Iran.  He sympathizes with the migrant, but has openly stated that borders mean something:

Leo has also defended the right of nations to control immigration, stating “If someone is in the United States illegally, there are ways to address this. There are courts. There is a judicial system….I think every country has the right to determine who enters, how, and when.”

Leo is pro-life.  He opposes abortion, euthanasia and the death penalty – again, consistent across the board on that issue.  On the issue of LGBTQ rights and same-sex marriage, he has expressed opposition to such doctrines that contradict the Gospel:

In 2012, Prevost criticized popular culture’s sympathy for the “homosexual lifestyle” and same-sex families. In April 2016, he opposed the inclusion of “gender ideology” in Peruvian primary school curricula, stating, “There are men and women, and we must respect the dignity of each person, including the choices that adults may have. Telling a child that they have not yet reached a sufficient level of development to choose regarding sexual identity and orientation will create a lot of confusion”. When asked in 2023 by Catholic News Service whether his views from 2012 had changed, Prevost said that “many things have changed” and emphasized the church should be more open and welcoming though he cautioned that church doctrine has not changed.

Whether by design or not, his voting record shows him having voted in both Democratic and Republican primaries.  On Climate Change, he has stated that the Church ought to take stronger action.  So, make up your own mind whether he is left or right.

Video: Trump Insists He Isn’t Feuding With Pope Leo: ‘I Have a Right to Disagree With The Pope’

On the War in Iran, he opposes Trump’s intervention, and that’s the current issue.

On the Papal plane en route to Cameroon, per the Associated Press, the Pope maintained his stance of peace over war.

Pope Leo XIV on Wednesday doubled down as U.S. President Donald Trump’s criticism showed no sign of letting up, insisting that the message ‘the world needs to hear today’ is one of peace and dialogue.

In that same article, Trump was blunt in his criticism of the Pope, accusing him of being weak on crime and a captive to the Left and said that Leo owed his papacy to Trump.  This was at the same time that Trump had posted an AI-generated image of himself as Jesus Christ.

Overnight, Trump posted ‘Not good!!!’ in response to a post citing social media posts by Leo before he was pope that were critical of Trump. And he wrote: ‘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.’

 While Trump’s Jesus image was over the top, so is Pope Leo’s calls for peace in certain instances where a war may be necessary.

A post on U.S. President Donald Trump’s Truth Social account depicts an AI-generated image of himself apparently as Jesus posted on April 12, 2026.

That is to say, there is no moral equivalency between Vladimir Putin invading Ukraine for the purpose of making the territory part of a new Russian empire, and Donald Trump toppling the drug lord in Venezuela and preventing the crazed ayatollahs from having a nuclear weapon.

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So, kudos to Bill O’Reilly for stating what ought to have been obvious. 

Both the President and the Pope have their points.

Peace on the world stage is always an admirable goal.  I think Donald Trump knows that quite well.  But there is evil in the world, and the Pope has to recognize that.  Sometimes, peaceful nations build weapons of war to deter other nations that are not peaceful.  Those weapons of war sometimes lead to peace.

Lynn Woolley is a Texas-based author, broadcaster, and songwriter.  Follow his podcast at https://www.PlanetLogic.us.  Check out his author’s page at https://www.Amazon.com/author/lynnwoolley. 

Order books direct from Lynn at https://PlanetLogicPress.Square.Site.  Email Lynn at lwoolley9189@gmail.com.

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