The Trump administration and the pope

Among all of the odd and peculiar actions of U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration — its starts and stops, its lurches forwards and backwards, its threats of annexations and tariffs and retribution — this has to rank as one of the strangest.

After Pope Leo XIV gave a State of the World speech in January, one that clearly but indirectly chastised the United States, the Trump administration reportedly told the Catholic Church that it had better fall in line.

The pope’s address said, “a diplomacy that promotes dialogue and seeks consensus among all parties is being replaced by a diplomacy based on force,” and “war is back in vogue, and a zeal for war is spreading.”

It should be said that the pope’s analysis is clearly correct, and that, while the United States wasn’t named, the Trump administration’s actions mirror the concerns the pope was raising.

U.S. Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Elbridge Colby called Cardinal Christophe Pierre, the Vatican’s U.S. representative, to the Pentagon.

“The United States,” Colby reportedly told Pierre, “has the military power to do whatever it wants in the world. The Catholic Church had better take its side.”

For its part, the Trump administration admits the meeting took place, but paints an entirely different picture. “The meeting between Pentagon and Vatican officials was a respectful and reasonable discussion,” a Defense Department official said in a statement. “We have nothing but the highest regard and welcome continued dialogue with the Holy See.”

U.S. Vice-President JD Vance — himself a Catholic — has said he wants to talk to Pierre to clarify what took place in the meeting.

But the reporting has a startling amount of detail, including the claim that Trump administration officials raised the spectre of the Avignon papacy during the meeting.

The short-hand version?

The Avignon papacy ran from 1305 to 1378.

It culminated with the Great Schism, a period which saw the Catholic faith having duelling Popes, with one in Avignon, France, and the other in Rome.

The Avignon papacy was triggered by King Philip IV of France sending men to kidnap Pope Boniface VII over long-running disputes about taxing the clergy and Boniface’s plans to excommunicate Philip. Philip accused Boniface of being an illegitimate holder of Papal office, and accused him of heresy, blasphemy, sodomy and sorcery.

Boniface was held for three days and died a month later, his death being attributed to his treatment during the siege of his Papal mansion and during the time he was held by French kidnappers.

He was replaced by Pope Clement V, who saw Philip much more favourably, even moving the Church’s administration to Avignon in France. (Clement being chosen as Pope apparently involved more than a few backroom machinations by Philip.)

Philip, by the way, wanted to punish Boniface even after his death, demanding Boniface be tried and convicted, and his bones disinterred and burned. (Boniface was tried, but there was no verdict and his bones remained intact.)

Papal officials, not surprisingly, took the Avignon reference by administration officials to be a direct threat against the Vatican.

Pope Leo is the first American Pope. He has apparently now turned down an invitation to attend an event celebrating America’s 250th anniversary, and will spend July 4 on the island of Lampedusa, which is well known as a landing place for North African refugees.

The Trump administration clearly fails to understand many things, including what faith entails — which, obviously, includes speaking truth to power.

Regardless of Trump’s beliefs, not everything is transactional, based on power and threats.

Pope Leo speaks out against injustice, cruelty and inhumanity. The idea that a government feels it can restrict the pope from speaking his conscience and temper his words because of threats is startling — even after everything the Trump administration has done so far.