Depending on which historical sources you care to consult, the Pope has been a figure of obloquy, ridicule and abomination.  This mediator between the terrestrial and the divine was always set for the battering.  Martin Luther’s violent Protestant split from the body of the Catholic Church was merely one aspect of attacking the occupants of that office.  Acrimonious disputes between the secular arm of the State and Church power have also figured.  In the 11th century, Pope Gregory VII famously battled the Holy Roman Emperor King Henry IV in the Investiture Controversy over who had the power to appoint bishops.

Pope Leo XIV, for his part, has become increasingly perturbed by President Donald Trump’s metamorphosis from an alleged eschewer of war to that of a spluttering warlord.

Pope Leo XIV, for his part, has become increasingly perturbed by President Donald Trump’s metamorphosis from an alleged eschewer of war to that of a spluttering warlord.

His remarks in January criticising US military action against Venezuela saw the Vatican’s ambassador called to an unpleasant meeting at the Pentagon.  In April, the pontiff responded to Trump’s annihilatory statements concerning Iranian civilisation by calling it “truly unacceptable”.  He exhorted believers to “Contact the authorities – political leaders, congressmen – to ask them, tell them to work for peace and to reject war always.”

Without naming US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, whose deranged notes of prayer for the war on Iran have not gone unnoticed, Leo declared that Jesus “does not listen to the prayers of those who wage war.”  In his April 11 prayer vigil for peace, Leo warned against the “delusion of omnipotence that is becoming increasingly unpredictable and aggressive”, describing death as an enslaver of “those who have turned their backs on the living God, turning themselves and their power into a mute, blind, and deaf idol”.

Such views were bound to draw a snarky,........

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