This is ridiculous.
The President took to social media again yesterday to announce that he doesn’t like the Pope:
What an irredeemably stupid thing to do.
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Ethics Alarms 
Another fine example of Donald Trump’s narcissistic, loose cannon, unethical mouth.
If he would just shut up!
The President should consider the words spoken by John F Kennedy during his race to become President in 1960.
https://www.jfklibrary.org/archives/other-resources/john-f-kennedy-speeches/american-society-of-newspaper-editors-19600421
In this speech JFK affirmed the separation of church and state in the USA, where no Catholic prelate would tell a president how to act, and no Protestant minister would tell their parishioners how to vote.
“For voters are more than Catholics, Protestants or Jews. They make up their minds for many diverse reasons, good and bad. To submit the candidates to a religious test is unfair enough – to apply it to the voters themselves is divisive, degrading and wholly unwarranted.“
The implication is that the statements of any prelate, or any council of churches carry no more weight in politics that the opinions of your neighbor who engages you in a political conversation while trimming the hedge. This implies that the President should give no more due reference to statements spoken by a prelate or council of churches than to anyone else who posts his opinion on the social media. Congress and SCOTUS are the only parties with legal standing to address the President, and the President should limit his response to those who have legal standing, or the the press when he is allowing a press conference.
The Church should be aware of the limitations on political speech. Jesus said “My kingdom is not of this world” (John 18:36) to Pontius Pilate. The nation states as we know today (and that includes the United States of America) are not faith communities, unlike Israel in the Old Testament; this implies that the standing of the Church to address a government is not comparable to the standing of an Old Testament prophet when addressing the King and the people of Israel.
Most statements on political matters (immigration, war, poverty) by church officials are existing political talking points carefully wrapped in theological language, with some Bible texts thrown in for good measure. These church officials are playing a cognitive dissonance game; the fact that a political statement is made by a prelate or theologian, appealing to the Scriptures or church doctrine, gives it authority.
By responding to church statements the President lends these statements more authority than warranted.
By responding to church statements the President lends these statements more authority than warranted.
Bingo. And attention.
Here is Cynical Publius take on papal interference with USA politics.
Yeah, that too.
I am adding a couple of more tweets, pointed to by Instapundit, to highlight what Pope Leo is doing. My editorial comment is that the Catholic Church should not act as if they are the Democrat Party in prayer.
And this tweet implies that the Catholic Church’s speaking out on USA immigration is corrupt due to a conflict of interest.
I am glad you did not use the punching down argument . Trumps comments may be used against him but Popes hold a great deal of influence over billions of people Catholic and Protestant alike.
I do appreciate the care you took in balancing your critique by holding both responsible for irresponsible comments. However, once the Pope weighed in on the issues I cannot fault the President for defending his policy in dealing with Iran.
He should have simply claimed the Popes remarks were aspirational but naive and when a roque nation has told the world it seeks the destruction of all another faiths and force those the leave alive to submit or die then someone needs to stand against those that are evil. He should end with for too long the Vatican has remained woefully silent on the behavior of Iran and its proxies who have brutalized its own citizens and facilitated or committed atrocities against non Muslims.