AT A CHRISTIAN worship service at the Pentagon last month, Pete Hegseth, the recently rebranded US “Secretary of War”, prayed for “overwhelming violence of action against those who deserve no mercy”.
“Let every round find its mark against the enemies of righteousness and our great nation,” Hegseth prayed.
“Give them wisdom in every decision, endurance for the trial ahead, unbreakable unity, and overwhelming violence of action against those who deserve no mercy.”
Days later, in an apparent rebuke of Hegseth during a Palm Sunday homily delivered from St Peter’s Square, Pope Leo XIV announced: “God does not listen to the prayers of those who wage war, but rejects them, saying: ‘Even though you make many prayers, I will not listen: your hands are full of blood’.”
It was a remark that angered many in the Trump MAGA camp.
“The Pope is wrong,” remarked one X user with over 31,000 followers.
“He doesn’t have the authority to arbitrarily decide whose prayers get heard.”
Meanwhile, White House press Secretary Karoline Leavitt, when asked about Leo’s Palm Sunday remarks, said: “I don’t think there is anything wrong with our military leaders or with the president calling on the American people to pray for our service members.”
Leo also used his Palm Sunday remarks to criticise the Israeli police for preventing a Cardinal from entering the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem to celebrate the feast.
Days later, he then called on Trump to seek an “off-ramp” to end the war on Iran and added:
“Hopefully he’s looking for a way to decrease the amount of violence, of bombing, which would be a significant contribution to removing the hatred that’s being created, and that’s increasing constantly, in the Middle East and elsewhere.”
This was the latest in a growing number of interjections by the pontiff on the war being waged by the US and Israel, but will his calls be heeded?
‘Marxist puppet’
When Leo was elected pope last year, his first words from the central balcony of St Peter’s Basilica were: “Peace be with you.”
But the response to the new pontiff from most within Trump’s MAGA movement was withering.
Laura Loomer, a far-right conspiracy theorist who was reported to have advised Trump on national security decisions, described Leo as a “Marxist puppet in the Vatican” and opined that “Catholics don’t have anything good to look for”.
Much of this stemmed from the new pope’s account on X, formerly Twitter, which has since been deleted.
Weeks before becoming pope, Leo shared a news article to X with the headline: “JD Vance is wrong.”
Former Fox News and NBC News host Megyn Kelly, who describes herself as “pretty conservative” and now has over four million subscribers to her independent YouTube channel, expressed hope that “some 20-year-old ran the new pope’s X account and he never looked at it”.
The relationship hasn’t softened since.
Earlier this year, in response to Trump’s immigration crackdown, Leo denounced the “inhuman” treatment of migrants in the US.
Trump’s border czar Tom Homan, himself a practicing Catholic, said he had “harsh words” for the pope and called for Leo “to concentrate on his work and leave border enforcement for us”.
He also falsely claimed there is a “wall around the Vatican to protect his people and himself”.
This wall is in fact a retaining wall and anyone can visit the Vatican.
Since the outbreak of war in Iran, Leo has continued to anger MAGA with his remarks on the conflict and Trump has directly responded to one of his comments.
During an Angelus address on 15 March, Leo appealed to “those responsible for this conflict: cease fire!”
“May paths of dialogue be reopened,” he added.
“Violence can never lead to the justice, stability and peace for which the peoples are waiting.”
Following this, a reporter asked Trump if he would heed Leo’s calls for a ceasefire.
“I don’t want to do a ceasefire,” said Trump.
“You don’t do a ceasefire when you’re literally obliterating the other side.”
Since then, Leo has spoken out against the conflict in most public appearances, including in brief remarks to journalists at Castel Gandolfo, where he spends most Tuesdays.
He has warned of a “spiral of violence” that could become an “irreparable abyss” and called on Christians who “bear grave responsibility in armed” to “make a serious examination of conscience and to go to confession”.
And in a speech delivered last month, Leo called for aerial bombing to be banned.
The following day however, Trump vowed to “keep bombing our little hearts out” if there was no deal with Iran to end hostilities.
Leo has also hit out the at White House for “gamifying” the war in Iran.
The White House has posted several videos of the war to social media that splices footage of aerial strikes with video game footage, such as Nintendo’s Wii Sports.
In a speech to journalists, Leo called on the media to report on the war with Iran “through the eyes of the victims, so as not to transform it into a videogame”.
He further remarked that the role of journalists to verify the news is “even more urgent and delicate” during war to prevent the media from “becoming a mouthpiece for those in power”.
Elsewhere, the Vatican’s Secretary of State Pietro Parolin last month warned about a “worrying erosion of international law” and hit out at the US and Iran for describing the conflict as a “preventive war”, warning that this logic risks “setting the world ablaze”.
Will Leo’s rebukes be listened to?
An NBC News poll last month among registered US voters found that Leo is most the favourably viewed popular American figure, far outranking Trump and Vance, and even ahead of the late night host Stephen Colbert.
But despite his popularity in the US, Trump has openly sparred with Leo and rebuked his calls for a ceasefire.
And while his words may have little sway with Trump, who has previously said he’s “not heaven-bound”, his remarks might land more with Vance or US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, both of whom are Catholic.
Vance converted to Catholicism as an adult and has a new book coming out in June that will explore his conversion.
However, relations between Leo and Vance are somewhat strained after the then Cardinal Robert Prevost shared a news article on X which read: “JD Vance is wrong: Jesus doesn’t ask us to rank our love for others.”
This was in response to Vance claiming that Catholic thought justified his administration’s immigration crackdown.
Meanwhile, days after becoming pope, Vance extended an invite to Leo to visit the US “as soon as he possibly can”.
There had been reports that it was hoped Leo would visit the US on 4 July, to coincide with the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence.
However, Leo will instead mark 4 July with a visit to the southern Italian island of Lampedusa, which is a gateway to Europe for hundreds of thousands of migrants fleeing war and poverty in Africa and the Middle East.
This was the first place Francis visited as pope in 2013.
Francis said he felt he “had to go” because “when I heard the news of yet another shipwreck just a few weeks before, the thought kept coming back to me, like a painful thorn in my heart”.
The Pope and politics
Meanwhile, some, such as Trump’s border czar, may argue that the pope should stay out of politics and current affairs altogether.
However, Leo has explicitly called for US bishops to speak out against the Trump administration.
Last October, a group called Hope Border Institute, which defends the rights of migrants along the US-Mexico border, met with Pope Leo.
Leo was filmed afterwards remarking that “the Church cannot be silent”.
The Bishop of El Paso, Texas, Mark Seitz, then said to Leo: “You’ve spoken very strongly and we’re trying to do the same in our country and yet not get into the political fray the best that we can.”
Leo replied: “Even within the [US Bishops] conference, there are challenges.
“I wish they were stronger in their own voice.”
The US Conference of Catholic Bishops heard this call and the following month, issued a statement saying that it was “disturbed” at the “climate of fear and anxiety around questions of profiling and immigration enforcement”.
“We feel compelled now in this environment to raise our voices in defence of God-given human dignity,” added the statement.