Pope Leo XIV has made a landmark four-day Apostolic Journey to France, marking his first trip to the nation as pontiff. This trip marked political and social balancing between the Vatican’s ties to traditional Catholic strongholds and an increasingly secular European population. The Vatican is approaching secular relations by bridging common interests and using such interests as common ground.
Read MoreAs Pope Leo enters the second year of his papacy, the battle lines are clearly drawn: between the desire for domination he observes in modern statecraft and the way of Jesus Christ he seeks to promote, the American pope finds himself at the center of a struggle for the very soul of the faith in his home country.
Read MoreIn a country that increasingly favors strict border policies, it is unlikely that the Pope’s letter will have any measurable influence on Trump’s immigration policy or his support amongst Catholics, which has only gone up following previous papal denunciations. While this suggests that any immediate policy impacts will be negligible, the letter is far from insignificant, underlining growing divisions within the Catholic Church around religious leaders participating in polarized U.S. policy issues like immigration.
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