While America as a country seems to be going very, very much backward in history, the Catholic church has never been more progressive.
While President Donald Trump continues his personal crusade to unravel the strides that the United States has made over the last several decades (particularly the ones accomplished by former President Barack Obama), Pope Francis has catapulted religion into the 21st century with his defense of the LGBT community and other minority groups — as well as his involvement in politics. Unfortunately for Trump, the Pope has regularly used his power to warn America about the unhinged POTUS.
One such moment is worth revisiting, as it serves as one of Pope Francis’ most striking messages to Americans about Trump’s bigotry after Trump was sworn in. As Trump’s attacks against immigrants have only gotten more inhumane, the pontiff’s message couldn’t be more worthy of a second look.
Pope Francis made some very striking comments during an interview with Spanish newspaper El Pais. During the interview, the pope slammed Trump’s U.S.-Mexico border wall and his passion for excluding foreigners with vicious practices like barbed wire. Stating that “crisis provokes fears and worries”, the pope used the example of “populism in the European sense of the word is Germany in 1933” and made a comparison between Trump and Hitler. In a haunting statement that sounds much like how Trump got elected, he said:
Germany … was looking for a leader, someone who would give her back her identity and there was a little man named Adolf Hitler who said ‘I can do it’. Hitler did not steal power. He was elected by his people and then he destroyed his people.”
Pope Francis also said that “the case of Germany is classic” and that Hitler had given his supporters a “deformed identity and we know what it produced.”
Hmm…some of that sounds awfully familiar. We all know how racist Trump’s supporters all are. The pope had issued criticism on Trump’s anti-immigration stance before this moment, and it was just as brilliant. The year before, Pope Francis said:
A person who thinks only about building walls – wherever they may be – and not building bridges, is not Christian …Â I’d just say that this man is not Christian if he said it this way.”
For such a prominent religious leader to condemn a president so strongly, it’s a shame that more Americans did not listen.
Featured image via screen capture
