PNN – Trump’s insult has been considered one of the rarest tensions between a US president and the Pope of the Catholic Church.
According to the report of Pakistan News Network, Western media wrote that US President Donald Trump launched a direct and sharp attack on Pope Leo XIV, the first American pope in history, on Sunday evening by publishing a message on the social network Truth Social and then in verbal statements to reporters.
In these remarks, Trump described the Pope as “weak against crime” and “a disaster in foreign policy,” saying: I’m not a big fan of Pope Leo. He also claimed the pope is beholden to the “far left” and should pull himself together and act like a pope, not a politician.
The Pope, however, maintained his position in his latest statements, stating that he did not intend to enter into a “debate” with Trump, emphasizing: I will continue to speak out against war, with the aim of promoting peace, encouraging dialogue and multilateral relations between governments to find just solutions to problems.
These statements came immediately after Pope Leo XIV’s criticism of the war and military threats against Iran, where the Pope described the war as “madness” and the threats as “unacceptable.”
International media described Trump’s action as unprecedented and politically unconventional, and considered it a direct attack on the spiritual leader of more than 1.4 billion Catholics in the world.
The British news agency Reuters described the remarks in a report as “an unusual and direct attack on the leader of the church” and wrote that Trump’s words provoked an immediate reaction from Catholic circles.
The London-based Guardian newspaper also called the move an “extraordinary attack” on the Pope, stressing that Trump had portrayed him as “weak” and “very bad” at foreign policy.
The Washington Post reported that Trump had even claimed to have played a role in electing Pope Leo and accused him of political ingratitude. At the same time, the New York Times described the attack as a sign of “the removal of any boundaries in Trump’s political tone,” and wrote that he had accused the Pope of “condescension toward crime.”
CNN and NBC News also described the remarks as “intense and unprecedented,” and reported that the disagreement between Trump and Pope Leo revolved largely around war and immigration.
Western media outlets have described the incident as one of the rare instances of tension between a U.S. president and the leader of the Catholic Church, an issue that analysts say could have far-reaching political and social consequences.