For
many, many, many moons, Donald Trump has
staggered through public
life like a vain, overstuffed man-child
pounding on the window of
history, begging to be handed a
Nobel
Peace Prize
he
has done nothing, not
a damn thing, on
God’s green earth to earn. He has hinted
at it, whined for it,
postured toward it, and lusted after it
with all the greasy
desperation of a man who wants the halo
but cannot be bothered with
the holiness.
So
there is something almost too
delicious,
too
blisteringly
absurd, too
drenched
in divine comedy about watching this white
male grievance machine
turn around and attack Pope Leo for doing
the very thing the Nobel
Peace Prize
is supposed to honor: promoting
peace.
That
alone deserves a slow clap.
I
am not Catholic; see, man-made,
organized-for-profit religion
disgusts me, but I will confess this much:
there is something deeply
soul-satisfying about watching Pope Leo
look at Christian
nationalism,
war
fever,
and
strongman politics and
answer with the ancient, scandalous idea
that human life actually
matters. Leo has repeatedly called for
peace, dialogue, and an end to
the exploitation and violence pushed by
authoritarian leaders, and he
has criticized the use of religion to
justify nationalist politics
and war. Trump, meanwhile, responded by
calling the pope “WEAK on
Crime, and terrible for Foreign Policy,”
because of course he did.
Pope
Leo needs new branding: Father
Real Deal, Pope L, Pope Brass Knuckle
Blessing, EL Cool P….(everyone
loves)
Check
it: in Trump’s diseased little cartoon of
manhood, anybody not
barking for total domination is
automatically a coward. Mercy
is
weakness. Restraint
is
weakness. Decency
is
weakness. Thoughtfulness is weakness.
Apparently, the only thing that
counts as strength in that busted theology
of power is being
loud, gaudy, vindictive, and
ugly
enough
to make Liberace
and Little Richard blush. In his world,
moral maturity is for
suckers, and the highest form of virtue is
a gold-plated tantrum with
a flag pin on it.
The
pope has moral convictions; Trump has
felony convictions.
and that contrast, right there, is the
whole sermon.
One
man speaks in the language of conscience.
The other speaks in the language of grievance,
threats,
and vanity
with
a side of cheap cologne. One points people
toward humility,
mercy, peace, and
the common
good.
The other points a trembling finger at the
world and shouts, “Why
am I not being praised enough?”
It
is less like comparing two leaders and
more like comparing a
lighthouse to a slot machine.
Naturally,
because this is America in its fully
weaponized absurdity, millions
of self-described Christians keep insisting
Trump is some kind of
chosen vessel. This is where satire starts
sweating, because reality
has already done all the heavy lifting. You
almost do not have to
exaggerate the man to make him sound like a
dark biblical warning
with a red tie.
Now,
no, I am not saying Donald Trump is
literally the anti-Christ. Let us
keep at least one foot attached to the
ground floor of reality. But
if someone wanted to entertain the idea
sarcastically, the case file
is embarrassingly thick.
Start
with the
worship of self.
Trump does not simply like attention. He
requires adoration. He has
built a political
religion around
himself, where truth is whatever protects
his ego, loyalty is
whatever flatters him, and sin is whatever
inconveniences him. That
kind of counterfeit holiness, where one
man demands devotion as if he
were above judgment, has a very old smell
to it. Sulfur-like, you
might say.
Then
there is the small issue of criminality.
Trump became the first former U.S.
president convicted of felony
crimes when a New York jury found him
guilty on all 34 counts in the
hush-money case. Plenty of sinners have
wandered through politics,
but Trump somehow turned felony paperwork
into part of the brand. Not
confession. Not repentance. Branding. He
did not stumble, apologize,
and seek grace. He strutted. He marketed
the hot mess.
Then
there is January
6,
that lovely little civics lesson in what
happens when a narcissist
cannot process losing. The House January 6
report concluded that
Trump’s false stolen-election claims were
central to the attack on
the Capitol. That matters not just because
it was lawless, but
because it was spiritually poisonous. It
taught millions of people to
prefer the lie that comforts their tribe
over the truth that saves
their democracy. That is devilish work
right there. Not merely
violence, but seduction into unreality.
Then
there is the cruelty.
The Trump administration’s
family-separation policy ripped
thousands of children from their parents
at the border. And even now,
some people still discuss that moral
atrocity as if it were an
unfortunate clerical event, like a mix-up
at the dry cleaner. No. It
was state cruelty directed at the
powerless, carried out in the name
of order by people who like to wear
crosses while breaking families
apart. That is not Christianity. That is empire
in
a red church hat.
Then
there is COVID.
During the pandemic,
Trump privately acknowledged the danger of
the virus while publicly
downplaying it. The United States went on
to suffer more than a
million deaths involving COVID-19. No
serious person says one man
caused every one of those deaths. But only
a fool ignores what
happens when a president knowingly
massages reality during a public
health disaster because honesty might
bruise his image. When vanity
sits in the cockpit during a plague,
people die. A lot of them. The
body count becomes part of the biography,
whether the biographer
likes it or not.
Then
there is the sexual
abuse
liability and the old pattern of public
humiliation. A jury found
Trump liable for sexually abusing E. Jean
Carroll, and later
judgments against him in related
defamation cases only deepened the
picture. Again, look at the pattern. Not
just accusation, not just
denial, but degradation. Shame as
domination. Cruelty as reflex. That
is not the behavior of a moral leader.
That is the behavior of a man
whose soul has long since been rented out
for commercial use.
Then
there is the theft
from
charity itself.
Trump was ordered to pay $2 million for
illegally misusing charitable
funds through the Trump Foundation. Even
the charity got hustled.
That almost deserves its own stained-glass
window in the cathedral of
American fraud. Leave it to Trump to walk
into a room labeled “good
works” and come out with the silverware.
And
finally, there is the language.
The dehumanization.
The way Trump has spoken of immigrants as
contaminating
the
blood of the nation. That kind of talk is
not just ugly. It is
historically radioactive. It strips people
of humanity, so cruelty
feels righteous. First, they are
poisonous. Then they are vermin.
Then anything done to them can be dressed
up as protection. History
has heard that music before, and it never
ends with a hymn.
So
when Pope Leo stands up and says peace
matters, dialogue matters,
exploiting people is evil, and religion
should not be used as a prop
for nationalist frenzy, he is not merely
disagreeing with Trump. He
is exposing the whole fraud. He is reminding
the world that
Christianity is supposed to be about
humility, mercy, justice, and
care for the vulnerable, not a permission
slip for domination by
loud, insecure men who think cruelty is
strength.
That
is what makes this moment so deliciously
revealing. Trump wants the
halo without the humility. He wants the
Nobel Prize without the
peace. He wants the Christian label without
the Christ. He wants the
crown, the anthem, the applause, the
incense, the loyalty, the
throne. He just does not want the teachings.
Those are inconvenient.
Those get in the way of the bloodlust and
the branding.
And
white
evangelical
Christian nationalism,
that
counterfeit gospel wrapped in a flag and
sold by men who confuse God
with hierarchy, is the perfect theology
for him. It asks for
obedience, not conscience. It blesses
power, not compassion. It
worships order, not justice. It treats
Jesus like a logo and the poor
like a nuisance. So naturally, it found
its
orange messiah.
Which
brings us back to the absurd masterpiece at
the center of it all:
Donald Trump, serial worshipper of force,
attacking the pope because
the pope promotes peace. The man who has
yearned for the Nobel Peace
Prize is now snarling at a religious leader
for speaking the language
of peace. That is not irony. That is satire
arriving already dressed,
already caffeinated, already halfway through
its opening monologue.
No,
I am not Catholic. But I know a moral
contrast when I see one. On one
side stands a pope preaching peace to a
violent age. On the other
hand stands Trump, a man with a rap sheet, a
mob, a cult, a mountain
of lies, and a bottomless appetite for
unearned praise, barking at
peace because peace does not flatter his
inflated image.
If
that is not a flashing warning light for the
republic, then America
is not just morally lost. It is spiritually
drunk, politically
concussed, and wandering into freeway
traffic with a Bible in one
hand and a Trump flag in the other.
