Donald Trump’s campaign for president has been a lot like the film Evil Dead 2 in that it’s switched rapidly back and forth between abject horror and slapstick comedy. Today has been one of the funnier moments, however, as Trump found himself in a verbal joust with Pope Francis.
Yes, you read that correctly.
MUST READ: Meet the obnoxious rich guy the Internet hates even more than the Pharma Bro
To be fair to Trump, the pope started this feud when he said that Trump “is not Christian” given his past comments such as calling Mexican illegal immigrants “rapists” and proposing banning Muslims from entering the United States.
“A person who thinks only about building walls, wherever they may be, and not building bridges, is not Christian,” the pope said, per The New York Times.
If you expected Trump to take this sort of thing lying down… actually, scratch that, there’s no way you could expect Trump to take this lying down. He immediately fired back at the pope by calling him a disgrace.
“For a religious leader to question a person’s faith is disgraceful,” Trump said. “No leader, especially a religious leader, should have the right to question another man’s religion or faith.”
Of course, Trump isn’t above questioning someone else’s faith. In fact, it was less than a week ago when he sent out the following tweet about rival candidate Ted Cruz:
https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/698115252844634112
Now, I’m not a religious person myself but if you asked me whether the pope or Donald Trump is more qualified to judge the sincerity of someone’s Christian faith, I’m pretty sure the His Holiness would take the crown hands down.
Trump also implied that the pope leads a weak church that doesn’t win anymore and that needs someone like Trump to rescue it. Specifically, he said that “if and when the Vatican is attacked by ISIS, which as everyone knows is ISIS’s ultimate trophy, I can promise you that the pope would have only wished and prayed that Donald Trump would have been president.”
And really, this is Trump bringing his A-game. The only way it could have been better would be if he’d bashed the Holy Roman Empire for getting “schlonged” by Napoleon at the Battle of Austerlitz. Maybe if Trump fails in his quest to be president, he can move to Italy and start his campaign to make the Vatican great again by pledging to bring back the Inquisition.
