A Clash of Ideologies

The honeymoon ended quickly for Pope Leo XIV as he is already embroiled in a bitter ideological dispute with the Trump administration. Some call his election a historic papacy with political consequences. Trump’s dream of a supportive pope has turned into a Holy War, that he did not see coming. I say ideological and not religious because I think the essential teachings of the Church are not the issue. It seems to be more of a debate of Trump’s policies not to the papal liking on immigration and the definition of the commandment: love of our neighbor. 

Church leaders during the last generation have supported and promoted a social doctrine that will invariably result in the Socialistic leveling of countries under the mantra of Social Justice. To date I do not think I have seen any plausible definition which conforms to my understanding of Church teachings on this issue. Just because the word Justice is used does not make it creditable.

In her essay for the National Circus, titled Pope Leo Condemns Moral Crisis of Trump’s America, Ivy Vega details Pope Leo’s objections to Trump’s policies on Immigration, Guns and Justice. In her section, The Pope’s Paper Trail, Vega details his objections to Trump’s policies on Immigration, Guns and Justice.

Even before the Conclave had chosen him as our next pope, Cardinal Prevost was busy on social media attacking the president on several issues. The pope’s animus for the president dates back to at least 2015. It was reported that Cardinal Prevost was criticizing Trump’s rhetoric as anti-immigration. In 2017 he slammed Trump’s refugee language such as bad hombre’s saying it was fueling racism and nativism. The latter has serious overtones for Catholics. The pope also supported gun control measures and expressed support for bishops who called Trump’s policies a dark hour in US history.

The pope also bitterly distains nationalism of any kind and so cannot support slogans, such as Make America Great Again. What the pope fails to recognize that when America is strong, the world is more at peace. It is only when America is weak that bad things happen.

It was not just Trump who suffered the ire of the future pope in February of 2025. The Cardinal contributed to an article to the liberal Catholic publication, The National Reporter, which was titled, JD Vance is wrong. He characterized the vice-president’s remarks on Fox News about prioritizing compassion for Americans citizens over immigrants, noting that such a ranking does not reflect Catholic values. Conservative commentator, Laura Loomer posted that the pope was Just another Marxist like Pope Francis. Social media erupted with additional attacks, which branded him as woke according to TIME.

While Pope Leo does fit right in with Pope Francis’ thinking on global Social Justice, to his credit he is opposed to abortion, same- sex marriage and gender ideology in schools. Unfortunately, this is not enough to offset his policies on immigration and gun control. He opposes the death penalty and opposes progressive education policies on gender. All this seems to contradict the fact that Pope Leo gathers most of his support from progressive Catholics, immigration advocates and South American clergy. 

In an essay for The Catholic Register, writer Jonah McKeown explored Vance’s thinking on the Catholic idea of Ordis Amoris, which Vance had invoked in his defense. The term means a rightly ordered love. McKeown did so within the context of the debate over Vance’s views on immigration, which had sparked a serious debate about its meaning and its application. 

Speaking on Sean Hannity’s show on Fox News, Vance opined that the far left in this country tend to have ‘more compassion’ for people residing in the country illegally than they do for American citizens. He added that many of these illegals are also responsible for many crimes committed on American citizens.

Vance received a lot of negative feedback after his Hannity appearance. One respondent, a British professor and politician Rory Stewart critiqued Vance’s comments as a bizarre take on John 15:12-13* and less Christian and more pagan tribal. In response, Vance suggests Stewart look up Ordo Amoris. And then he continued the idea that there isn’t a hierarchy of obligations violates basic common sense. I would add human nature as well. His rhetorical question to Stewart, Does Rory really think his moral duties to his own children are the same as his duties to a stranger who lives thousands of miles away? Does anyone?

Vance also disagreed with the pope’s view on Love thy neighbor. The Vatican seems to imply that we should love all people equally without any hierarchy of love. This seems to not only be a violation of the natural law but a notion that could easily devolve into nonsense.

Vance, who is a convert to the Catholic Church, seems to be well versed in his new faith. He believes that one’s compassion first goes and foremost to one’s family. A man who would go out and save the world, while ignoring the basic needs of his family has a seriously distorted view of love. Then there are people in one’s circle of friends, business associates, clients and anyone for whom contact is regular. Vance says: you love your family, and then after that you can love your neighbors, your community and your fellow citizens in your own country, and then you can focus and prioritize the rest of the world.

In his defense, the Vice-President offers his understanding of what his critics are actually saying. A lot on the far left has completely inverted this. They seem to hate the citizens of their own country and care more about people outside their own borders. That is no way to run a society. The tricky one concerns people in foreign lands or people we will never meet. Personally, I learned many years ago that we love all these strangers by never wishing them any harm, and hoping that they are living in peace, especially peace of soul. 

I found Vance’s list of intellectual supporters to be not only highly persuasive but also  very prominent in the Church’s teachings. While one will not find Ordo Amoris in the Catholic Catechism, it does have a frequent space in its traditions. Revelation certainly demonstrates a hierarchal structure to charity in man. Sts Augustine and Aquinas used reason to help us more fully understand Jesus’ command to love one another. In an article on Vance for the National Catholic Register, cannon lawyer and professor, Jonah McKeown cited Dominican Father Pius Pietrzyk when he wrote the concept of Ordo Amoris is well-established and is evident by both revelation and reason. 

St. Augustine, a highly influential theologian and an early bishop in the Church uses the term, (of Ordo Amoris) frequently in his classic, City of God. Augustine defines it to mean, a rightly ordered love. He also equates it with the idea of virtue. He later expanded on these ideas in his work, On Christian Doctrine. One passage seems to have expressed every aspect of this idea: A man neither loves what he ought not to love, nor fails to love what he ought to love…nor loves equally which ought to be loved less or more, nor loves that less or more which out to be loved equally…

St. Thomas of Aquinas, a 13th century doctor of the Church expanded on St. Agustine’s thinking in his Summa Theologica. He reasons that there must be some order in things loved out of charity… in reference to the first principle of that love, which is God. He adds that Ordo Caritas is a principle that dictates how we should love God, ourselves and our neighbors in a hierarchical and interconnected manner. Echoing St. Augustine, Aquinas clarifies this teaching when he argues that while one should love all people equally, one ought to chiefly consider those who are more closely united by reason of place, time or other circumstances.

Like Augustine he states that God is to be loved first and foremost, followed by oneself, then and among neighbors…there are those who should be loved with an intense affect, such as family…. While this list does not pretend to diminish the importance of loving all people as Christ commanded, it does acknowledge that certain relationships, practically speaking, carry more immediate obligations. For example, a married person has a higher obligation to care for his or her spouse than for others…

I think Pope Leo would say there are serious cautions. While theologians agree there is a hierarchy, this does not exclude the people who are not part of our family, including immigrants and migrants. However, this opens some new, more sensitive questions on whether there are any reciprocal responsibilities of such outsiders to our citizens. 

And what are the respective duties of their former countries? It is a substantiated fact that many nations virtually opened their prisons and sent their criminals to the United States. These made up a good number of the immigrants who were swiftly deported to their native homes. This does not conform to the idea of A Good Neighbor.

Does skipping the standard procedures for safe entry and application for citizenship in this country remove their obligation to obey this country’s laws and regulations? This question almost becomes mute when their very presence makes them law-breakers. Does not Justice demand that migrants must obey our laws like citizens of this country? Does their presence make them more equal than our own citizens and legal immigrants, who followed the rules? To say yes to these questions would serve to undermine America’s rule of law and put extra burdens on all of our rights. 

This leads to my last and most difficult question. For years I have been following the Church’s views on immigration. I think it has been slyly encouraging refuges to ignore our immigration laws. I say this because Church leaders have constantly resorted to a euphemism** to describe these illegal immigrants. By this I mean the contrived use of undocumented, which hides the real meaning of their American status.

Years ago, I asked a visiting priest who had to read our Bishop’s letter on this subject. The letter used undocumented, which had become a standard substitution. After Mass, I asked him if there were any difference between his term and illegal. His silence shouted his answer loudly. The Church teaches that one must never lie or deceive, even to perform a good act. Is not this verbal legerdemain meant to deceive us into sanctioning the Church’s disregard for our laws on immigration?

While I grant there have been excesses in President Trump’s gigantic round-up of all the illegals who sneaked into our country with the blessing of former president Joe Biden, I listened as the Church said nothing about this wholesale violation of a country’s suzerainty. Does the Church not realize what physical harm, unfettered migration has done to the American people? If the Church is going to encourage law breaking, why not focus on abortion laws which are an embarrassment to our country’s history and a fatal danger to our unborn? 

James Woods is a Hollywood actor, who often professes his conservative views. In answer to critics of Trump’s immigration policies, he said WE have LAWS for legal immigration. Anyone who breaks those laws or enables another person to do so should be deported or imprisoned, respectively. He is incredulous that people cannot fathom this basic truth.

The contrast of the papacy’s treatment of our most recent presidents is glaring. Pope Francis never said a discouraging word about Joe Biden, who contrary to Church teachings, distinguished himself as the most pro-abortion president in our history. Yet he shamelessly proclaimed to the world that he a was a devout Catholic. He was a constant visitor to Rome and often visited with the pope. He could not tell us too often the pope said he was a good Catholic.

Pope Francis never denied any of this. Since he has become president, Trump has done more on ridding us of this evil than any other president in history. The Papacy’s silence on this tells us that immigration will always Trump the life of the unborn. I am really troubled by the Church’s dismissive attitude of Trump’s heroic effort to chase abortion and Planned Parenthood from the national consciousness. Pope Francis virtually ignored abortion while our new pope is supposed to be aligned with our pro-life beliefs but has yet to praise our president’s efforts.

Trump has replaced the poor and the refuges with the problems of this country. Thanks to Biden shamelessly invited several millions of immigrant to over-run our borders and create havoc about our citizens. These illegals became Trump’s first priority. The results have become tangible with fewer violent crimes since he came to Washington. 

The Vatican seems indifferent to American laws and our right to protect our nation from invaders. They fail to recognize that a nation that cannot control its borders is doomed to extinction. That is not nationalism speaking but more the loud voice of pure common sense. ***  

In an essay for The Hill, former Catholic Brad Bannon attempts to answer my question as to why Church leaders favor Democrats, like Biden, over Trump. He attributes this due to a clash of ideologies. Bannon, like the pope is a Villanova graduate. He was heartened by the fact that Pope Leo and his progressive agenda, with its economic justice and immigration fairness. To be honest, I really do not understand what these ideas have to do with Catholic teaching.

I think Trump’s real problem comes from the Church’s failure to separate legal immigrants from those whom Joe Biden invited to overwhelm our Southern borders in hope of harvesting millions of new voters for the Democratic Party. Too many church leaders have adopted this progressive way of thinking, which puts the masses ahead of the safety of the American people. To me it seems more a political conflict than a religious one.

*The Bible verse reads: ‘This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved.’

**As I wrote in another essay, a euphemism is a word or phrase that is used to hide or color the meaning of the true state of its subject. See ‘Catholic Ethics Requires Rose-colored Glasses,’ written six months ago.

*** I refer you to Vincent Ruggerio’s recent essay ‘Returning to Common Sense’ for a deeper insight into this phenomenon.