The bishop of Palm Beach has rebuked Donald Trump for his “disrespectful and violent attacks” on Pope Leo XIV, as outrage over the president’s feud with the pope reaches his own backyard.
Bishop Manuel de Jesús Rodríguez, whom Pope Leo XIV appointed as bishop of the Diocese of Palm Beach in December, delivered a scathing rebuke of Trump during Sunday Mass, a week after the president lashed out at the pope in a deranged Truth Social meltdown.
“The Diocese of Palm Beach stands firm with our Holy Father, Pope Leo XIV, and strongly rejects the disrespectful and violent attacks that Donald J. Trump has directed against the Holy Father,” a projected statement read, according to a photo posted by Catholic commentator Christopher Hale.
The statement continued, “These attacks also constitute a grave violation of the religious freedom enshrined in the Constitution of the United States and, as such, harm the rights of the American Catholic faithful.”
“Please pray for the safety of the Holy Father,” the statement concluded, signed off with Rodríguez’s name. The Dominican-born bishop previously served as a pastor at a Catholic church in Queens, New York, roughly seven miles from where Trump was raised.
The bishop’s rebuke brings the fallout from Trump’s feud with the pope uncomfortably close to the president’s Florida home: the Diocese of Palm Beach is located roughly 13 miles from the president’s Mar-a-Lago estate, where first lady Melania Trump, a Catholic, lives apart from her husband.
The Daily Beast has reached out to the White House and the Diocese of Palm Beach for comment.
Trump, 79, went after Leo, 70, in a striking broadside last week, calling the spiritual leader of more than a billion Catholics “WEAK on Crime, and terrible for Foreign Policy,” and claiming credit for his elevation to the papacy.
“Leo should be thankful because, as everyone knows, he was a shocking surprise. He wasn’t on any list to be Pope, and was only put there by the Church because he was an American, and they thought that would be the best way to deal with President Donald J. Trump,” the president declared in his tirade, which came after weeks of mounting frustration over Leo’s criticism of the U.S.’s war on Iran.
The Christian-identifying president then shared an AI-generated image depicting himself as Jesus, though he later deleted it amid widespread backlash.
Following Trump’s attack, Leo said he “had no fear” of the Trump administration, or “speaking out loudly of the message of the Gospel.”
Still, the president has not let up on hounding the Chicago-born pontiff, falsely claiming on Thursday that the pope said that Iran can have a nuclear weapon.
Leo told reporters aboard the papal plane on Saturday that he doesn’t want to be roped into a feud with Trump, saying it’s not in his “interest” to debate the president.
MAGA diehard Mike Flynn, a retired lieutenant general who served as national security adviser during the first Trump administration, railed against Rodríguez’s rebuke of the president on X.
“This was at a prominent Catholic Church in Florida today. This type of information warfare against ‘MAGA’, against President Trump, is just beginning. It is dangerous, it is very political, it is fifth generational, and most definitely, it is spiritual warfare,” the infamous conspiracy theorist fumed.
“It is shocking how many Catholics are upset at Trump currently. It shows the unhealthy allegiance that they hold for any man, including the Pope,” he continued, declaring that Leo “as a man, needs to be reminded that humility in the face of God is courage.”
“This Pope is consciously choosing political sides. He is emerging as a woke globalist instead of a humble servant of Jesus Christ representing the Church of Peter,” Flynn wrote.
