Trump likely pay his respects on Saturday at his death, despite his disagreements with Pope Francis regarding ideas. On Easter Monday, Pope Francis took his last mouth.
There are ideological distinctions between Pope Francis and Trump. For instance, Pope Francis made an appeal to the excluded and migrants in his last public address on Easter Sunday only one day before he passed away.
He declared,” All of us are God’s kids”! In comparison, President Donald Trump posted a crude message seeking a joyful Easter to his rivals, including” Radical Left Lunatics,”” Weak and Ineffective Judges and Law Enforcement Officials,” and” Worst and Most Ignorant President,” expressing his dislike for both.
As Trump travels to Rome on Friday for Francis ‘ death, which is scheduled to take place on Saturday night in St Peter’s Square, some of the basic differences between the US senator and the late bishop will come into sharper focus.
The connection between Trump and Francis was described as a “freak marriage,” according to David Gibson, director of the Center on Religion and Culture at Fordham University in New York.
The partnership became less stable:
During Trump’s second word, from 2017 to 2021, things hadn’t been so well between the pontiff and Trump. Gibson notes that Trump v. 2.0 was even worse with the Vatican because it has been much more intense on every degree against immigrants and against international support.
The pope of Argentina and the president of America disagreed on the immigration problem. People who constructs a wall to prevent immigrants is” not Christian,” Francis said in 2016 in an indirect reference to next Republican presidential candidate Trump. Trump called Trump’s statement “disgraceful.”
Trump has managed to gain increasing aid among American Catholics despite Pope Francis ‘ focus on humility, diversity, and liberal stances on issues like multiculturalism and climate change. Particularly among liberal Catholics, this support is powerful.
Trump refers to himself as a “non-denominational Christian,” meaning he doesn’t adhere to established church structures and places an emphasis on a strong relationship with God. His policies on abortion, including appointing three of the five justices to the U.S. Supreme Court who influenced the repeal of the country’s abortion laws, have gained more followers among Christians, specifically traditional Catholics.
Last year, the Republican leader made a sincere request to Catholic to vote for him. Trump made an appeal at the Al Smith donation dinner in New York in October, which raised millions of dollars for Catholic charities. He said,” You gotta get out and vote. And Catholics, you gotta voting for me, too.
Trump won the Catholic voting in the 2024 votes, according to AP VoteCast, which conducted a survey of more than 120 000 citizens. The Catholic vote was evenly split between Kamala Harris and Joe Biden in 2020, but in 2024, 54 % of Catholic voters voted for Trump and 44 % against Kamala Harris.
Trump was unsuccessful in gaining Pope Francis ‘ acceptance despite Catholic support:
Trump does have won the Catholic ballot, but he was unable to overthrow Pope Francis. Pope Francis ‘ conflicts with the management were dismissed by Vice President JD Vance, a Catholic, who had a brief meeting with him the day before he passed away. He claimed the bishop was” a much broader number” than British politics- a man who led a chapel with 1.4 billion people globally.
He continued,” I’m informed that he had some disagreements with some of our administration’s guidelines.”
He even shared many views on some of our administration’s policies. By talking about politics, I won’t damage the boy’s tradition.
Trump and Pope Francis argued over the 2017 Vatican’s respectful gathering, but their differences persisted. Francis wrote a letter to US priests in February 2025 to protest the current mass deportations carried out by the Trump presidency. He made note of the fact that the baby Jesus and his relatives were themselves migrants in Egypt and feared for their lives in the Bible.
Some influential bishops praised some of the new Trump administration’s “school selection” and “gender as determined at birth” initiatives. While supporting religion gender lessons, Francis took a more accepting position toward LGBTQ+ individuals.
Other well-known priests, who Francis had appointed, have a higher regard for Francis ‘ interests. Cardinal Robert McElroy, the novel pope of Washington, is one of them.
Despite their differences, Trump chose to pay his respects to Pope Francis in Rome.
Trump’s policies have a positive impact on traditional Catholics, in contrast to Pope Francis ‘ liberal plan:
Some traditional Catholics, despite respecting the pope, “didn’t like his liberal opinions” on refugees and his approving of gifts for same-sex lovers, according to John Fea, a professor of history at Messiah University in Pennsylvania.
” The views of many conservative American Catholics align with Trump’s brand of populism: strict borders, pro-life on abortion, concern about critical racial theory in schools, etc. Fea, the author of” Believe Me: The Evangelical Road to Donald Trump,” wrote in an email.
The pope and Trump both held opposing views on environmental issues, aside from immigration. Trump was eager to revive the fossil fuel industry, despite the pope’s call for immediate action on climate change. Trump supported a policy that he vehemently opposed, including the death penalty.
According to Steven Millies, director of the Bernadin Center at the Catholic Theological Union in Chicago, Trump and Francis do share some policy objectives regarding issues like religious freedom and abortion. ” But the alignments were at the diplomatic level more than the personal or political level, of course,” he said.
They were “profoundly different people,” according to one who had been shaped by Jesuit spirituality and lived his life in a deepening faith that he shared with the world, the other who manipulated Scripture quotations, sold Bibles for personal gain, and used Christian faith as a brand identity in a market war.
