A Catholic Defense of Donald Trump

“Does our law judge a man without first giving him a hearing and learning what he does?” (John 7:51).

These were the words of Nicodemus after the Pharisees closed in to arrest Our Lord in Jerusalem during the Feast of Tabernacles. In this essay, I will attempt to offer Nicodemus’ defense of the accused Christ to the President of the United States, Donald J. Trump, after he caught the ire of Catholics across the globe this week.

Before we begin our hearing, let us revisit the scene in John 8 when the Pharisees catch a woman in the act of adultery and bring her before Christ:

“The scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught in adultery, and placing her in the midst they said to him, ‘Teacher, this woman has been caught in the act of adultery. Now in the law Moses commanded us to stone such. What do you say about her?’ This they said to test him, that they might have some charge to bring against him. Jesus bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground. And as they continued to ask him, he stood up and said to them, ‘Let him who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone at her.’ And once more he bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground. But when they heard it, they went away, one by one, beginning with the eldest, and Jesus was left alone with the woman standing before him. Jesus looked up and said to her, ‘Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?’ She said, ‘No one, Lord.’ And Jesus said, ‘Neither do I condemn you; go, and do not sin again.’” (John 8:3-11).

A similar scene has presented itself to us today. The knives are out for our President, and the Pharisees online have all watched and waited, for months on end, for Donald Trump to do something so unforgiveable that they can wash their hands and be done with him. Seventeen months after Catholics helped put him back in the White House, many are throwing Trump to the wolves after getting exactly what they voted for.

Anyone acquainted with the political scene, however, knows this 180° turn from Catholics did not happen in a vacuum overnight. Instead, from peer pressure online and the fomenting of Internet mobs, they each waited for the one sin that turned them off so much that they could finally join the mob themselves. Trump hate is what’s popular online today, and populist influencers couldn’t wait to stand alongside the radical left in saying, “I don’t like Trump either.” Some started abandoning Trump as early as his second term began, when the mass deportations they voted for became a reality. His administration’s handling of the Epstein Files, Operation Fury in Iran, and his sarcastic jabs at radical Islam on Easter lost him Catholic support online too.

A growing number of online Catholics already felt uneasy with President Trump, in large part due to the rising scapegoating of Jews for our country’s problems, since they believe Trump is acting in Israel’s interest and not ours. Tempers were already at a boil and ready to blow at any moment. This week, President Trump handed his critics a golden platter after his imprudent remarks towards Pope Leo XIV, turning him into the universal scapegoat across parties. After months of rising tensions, this was the breaking point for many.

“Where, one wonders, must they have been standing and how long must they have been waiting in order to catch this unfortunate in flagrante? Their eagerness to find a victim, and their willingness to go to great extremes in the process, is eloquent testimony to the common and insatiable human need for scapegoats”.[1] The human need to scapegoat, writes Bishop Barron in the first volume of the Word on Fire Bible, is “demonic”. He defines a scapegoat as someone upon who “is cast the collective anxiety of the group.” This week, the whole of the X community, both left and right, rallied to scapegoat President Trump for his sins and wash their hands of him.

In his commentary on John 8, Bishop Barron continues, “Having discovered her in her sin, they rush her to a prominent religious spokesperson… Because it creates a sense of community, however perverted, scapegoating is practically irresistible, especially to those who feel threatened by already-existing tensions and rivalries within a group”.[2] Even the USCCB and the Knights of Columbus, who are conveniently silent when politicians of the other party assault the Body of Christ, rallied to join the mob, and have placed American Catholics in the uncomfortable position of feeling like they must choose between our President or our Pope, and cannot support both.

Thankfully, Our Lord offers us a way out of the dangerous either-or mentality. “By declining to cooperate with the process, Jesus effectively breaks its momentum”.[3] Instead of joining the Pharisees to condemn the adulteress, Jesus holds up a mirror to the Pharisees and forces them to confront their own sins. He never excuses her sins, but withholds judgment and offers grace instead. “Having stopped its momentum by his silence, Jesus dissolves the crowd by his speech,” writes Barron.[4] The world loves to form mobs, but Our Lord dissolves them and stands alongside the sinner to say in a moment of divine love, “Neither do I condemn you.”

It’s easy to condemn Trump when everyone else is too. There is no virtue in following the crowd. But will you defend him when no one else is? Our Lord is not in the crowd. If you look for him there, you will not find him. He is standing in front of it to prevent them from casting their stones. President Trump is not Catholic, and even if he were, he is at liberty (just as we are) to disagree with the Pope’s personal opinions. He does not see Pope Leo XIV as his spiritual father and had many similar back-and-forths with the late Pope Francis. Trump did not win the Catholic vote because we expected him to be lockstep with Rome, but because his policies had the most overlap with our vision for the country. It seems that in our need to scapegoat, we have forgotten this.

Once we place ourselves at this scene and find Our Lord alone with President Trump uttering these words of grace, we can return to Nicodemus’ question to his fellow Pharisees. “Does our law judge a man without first giving him a hearing and learning what he does?” (John 7:51). Rather than hyperfocus on President Trump’s “mean tweets”, which everyone who voted for him knew he had been doing for the past decade and would continue to do in office his second term, let’s look at his record and learn what he does in his actual capacity as Commander in Chief, and how that has aligned with the protection and promotion of the common good.

“If I am not doing the works of my Father, then do not believe me; but if I do them, even though you do not believe me, believe the works, that you may know and understand that the Father is in me and I am in the Father” (John 10:37-38). Our Lord told the Pharisees that if they did not believe his words, to believe his works. The President of the United States is not elected to be a public speaker or a theologian, but to be the highest executive in the land and form good policies. Rather than pretend that President Trump is hostile to the Catholic faith because of his comments about the Pope, let’s look at his works instead:

• Appointed several prominent Catholics to top positions, including JD Vance as Vice President, Marco Rubio as Secretary of State, Sean Duffy as Transportation Secretary, RFK Jr. as HHS Secretary, Lori Chavez-DeRemer as Labor Secretary, Linda McMahon as Education Secretary, Elise Stefanik as UN Ambassador, and John Ratcliffe as CIA Director.
• Established the Religious Liberty Commission, appointing Cardinal Timothy Dolan, Bishop Robert Barron, Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone, Bishop Thomas Paprocki, Bishop Kevin Rhoades, and Father Thomas Ferguson as key advisors.
• Held a National Day of Prayer and issued proclamations honoring religious freedom and Christian holidays.
• Signed an executive order recognizing only two genders.
• Signed an executive order protecting children from chemical and surgical mutilation, banning federal support for youth transitions.
• Signed an executive order keeping men out of women’s sports.
• Signed an executive order making Christmas Eve and the day after Christmas federal holidays.
• Signed an executive order to eradicate anti-Christian bias in the federal government.
• Signed an executive order expanding school choice and parental rights in education.
• Signed an executive order strengthening faith-based partnerships in foster care and adoption.
• Reinstated the Mexico City Policy to block U.S. taxpayer funds from going to foreign organizations that promote or perform abortions.
• Enforced the Hyde Amendment to stop federal funding of elective abortions.
• Pardoned pro-life activists who were convicted under the FACE Act by Joe Biden.
• Issued the National Sanctity of Human Life Day proclamation and spoke at the March for Life.
• Created the White House Faith Office.
• Expanded the Child Tax Credit and adoption tax credits.
• Defunded Planned Parenthood through Medicaid reforms, resulting in dozens of clinic closures.
• Rescinded dozens of Biden-era rules promoting abortion, gender ideology, and DEI across federal agencies.
• Strengthened conscience protections for doctors, nurses, and pharmacists who object to abortions.
• Supported religious charter schools and gave parents greater rights to inspect school records.
• Directed the State Department to prioritize international religious freedom and combat global Christian persecution.
• Hosted persecuted Christians from countries like China, Nigeria, and Cuba at the White House.
• Defended persecuted Christian communities worldwide that have been targets of Islamic terrorism.

For just one year in office, this is an incredible list of good works, which still doesn’t even begin to scratch the surface. Recent policy disagreements and mean tweets should not erase or distort his record as a President who is married to a Catholic, appointed devout Catholics to fill the most important cabinet positions, appointed two Catholic Supreme Court justices, and takes the advice of highly orthodox priests and bishops to inform his policy decisions.

Even on matters such as the airstrikes in Iran (which was the basis for many Catholics splitting from MAGA), the USCCB has tied the hands of the faithful to convince them they are in sin if they agree with the President. Catholics can in good conscience, however, disagree with them and discern that Trump’s actions are just. Pope Benedict XVI affirmed this in a 2004 document on general principles for Holy Communion, writing, “It may still be permissible to take up arms to repel an aggressor or to have recourse to capital punishment. There may be a legitimate diversity of opinion even among Catholics about waging war.”[5]

Benedict XVI sounded the alarm to the Western world in 2007 about what would happen if nuclear weapons fell into the hands of Islamic terrorists, and also wrote the following warning:

“Given the fact that terrorist agents, or even conventional organized crime (which is constantly strengthening and extending its network), could gain access to nuclear arms and biological weapons, the peril that threatens us has reached frightening dimensions… What can we do, what must we do in this situation? First of all, we need to consider several fundamental truths. One cannot put an end to terrorism – a force that is opposed to the law and cut off from morality – solely by means of force. It is certain that, in defending the law against a force that aims to destroy law, one can and in certain circumstances must make use of proportionate force in order to protect it.”[5]

He then goes a step further by saying it is an injustice to stand by and do nothing:

“An absolute pacifism that denies the law any and all coercive measures would be capitulation to injustice, would sanction its seizure of power, and would abandon the world to the dictates of violence.”[7]

A man ahead of the times, Benedict XVI even noted in a speech in 1991 how dangerous the anti-American propaganda was under the Iranian regime, calling it the starting point of modern-day terrorism. “It is important that one make a distinction between the starting point of the new Islamic awakening and then the different forms that this takes. As for the starting point, it seems to me very significant that the first indications of the turning point in Iran were attacks on American movies. The Western way of life with its moral permissiveness was felt to be an attack on their own identity and on the dignity of their own way of life.”[8]

The clarity with which the late pontiff spoke is a refreshing reminder to Catholics that there is more nuance to the conflict with Iran than just “war bad”. We can certainly disagree with Operation Fury’s expediency and oppose civilian casualties, but these are not the bases the USCCB used to justify their opposition. They have called the conflict unjust merely because “to be a just war it must be a defense against another who actively wages war” and even went so far as to insinuate that God doesn’t hear President Trump’s prayers.[9] However, considering Iran has attacked the United States hundreds of times over the last four decades and killed 7x more Americans than Nazi Germany did prior to us entering WWII (a war we all consider just), it is not factual to say that Iran has not actively waged war against the United States. Again, one can oppose the conflict if their conscience convicts them to, however it is untrue to say Iran has not attacked the United States and expressed future plans to do so with inter-continental ballistic missiles. The truth must always be the starting point of all Christian discernment.

I pray that in the decisive months ahead, the Catholics who voted for Donald Trump, as the last bulwark against communism and the enemies of Christianity, will lay down their stones and consider the situation according to the whole. As we celebrate what would be his 99^th birthday, it is time to speak with as much honesty, conviction, and Christological depth as Pope Benedict XVI, rather than intellectually shallow, feel-good platitudes. I pray also that the Church can address the important concerns that President Trump raises, and answer with as much clarity as Benedict XVI. Where does she stand on a nuclear Iran? Or on the sex trafficking of children and drugs being smuggled through Mexico? If nations have rights to their borders, what does the application of that look like to the Magisterium? Was Pope Leo XIV referring to President Trump when he said God “does not listen to the prayers of those who wage war, but rejects them”?[10] The faithful deserve their shepherds to answer them clearly and precisely, not in vagaries.

We don’t need to pretend that President Trump is suddenly an enemy to Catholicism because of his tweet to Pope Leo, just so we can fit in with the mob that has made him our scapegoat. The mob doesn’t want Trump’s blood. The mob wants yours and mine. The mob wants Christ’s. Right now, Donald Trump stands in the way of their goal, which is why their teeth are so sharp. Catholicism is growing rapidly in the United States, and the enemy has found our weak link to halt our growth and make us consider our friends as our enemies.

Here is the reality that we are facing in the absence of Donald Trump. Socialism, abortion on demand through all nine months of pregnancy, chemical castration and transitioning of children, LGBT down the throats of our children, the destruction of parental rights and homeschooling, the criminalization of free speech, the absolute removal of Christianity from the public square, the persecution of pro-lifers and political dissenters, more drugs and crime in our communities, violence against political rivals, and the Islamification of the United States. We are talking about something more than just minor policy disagreements. We are talking about the fundamental destruction of the United States of America, the nature of man, and the origin of being. The alternative to Trump is the rejection of reality itself.

So ask yourself this. Are Donald Trump’s tweets really worth throwing away our country over? Is it worth subjecting your children and fellow Christians to radical leftist persecution? Or does the most openly pro-Catholic administration of our lifetime deserve our continued prayers and support to save the United States and build a better tomorrow for our children to know the love of Jesus Christ? Echoing the words of Benedict XVI, I believe that abandoning Trump and letting the floodgates of leftism open “would be capitulation to injustice” and “would abandon the world to the dictates of violence.” A prophet ahead of his times, Benedict knew that anti-American propaganda in Iranian media was the starting point for terrorism in the world. How are we so foolish that even those who voted for Donald Trump are now falling for the same anti-American propaganda online themselves?

I never wanted to incorporate politics into my articles here on this website, but since the enemies of truth have wielded the link between faith and politics as a sword for our destruction, the Holy Spirit invited me to remind those hyper-focused on partial truths to take a step back and look at the bigger picture. We are not serving the man, Donald Trump. We are serving the mission of God, to allow his grace to transform our lives, our families, and our communities.

Do not become a slave to the algorithm. Do not become a tool for the mob. Keep your lips sealed when they shout “Crucify him!” and refrain from joining in. Our country won’t embrace Catholicism through stones, but through the Cross. Pick up your cross and carry it for him so he can continue to serve our country to the best of his God-given ability these next three years. If President Trump can stand up and yell “Fight!” after taking a bullet for our country, can you take a mean tweet?

“A republic… if you can keep it.” – Benjamin Franklin

CITATIONS

[1] Barron, Word on Fire Bible, 509.

[2] Ibid., 510.

[3] Ibid.

[4] Ibid.

[5] https://www.ewtn.com/catholicism/library/worthiness-to-receive-holy-communion-general-principles-2153

[6] Joseph Ratzinger, The True Europe: Its Identity and Mission (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2024), 77.

[7] Ibid.

[8] Ibid., 168-169

[9] https://www.usccb.org/news/2026/us-bishops-chairman-doctrine-issues-clarification-just-war-theory

[10] https://www.vatican.va/content/leo-xiv/en/homilies/2026/documents/20260329-palme.html