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PaperclipPerfector  3d ago (text post)   13654 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of April 6, 2026

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It turns out Greenland/Denmark and Canada aren't the only friendly countries that the US has been threatening, the Vatican's ambassador to the US (according to The Free Press and Letters from Leo a Catholic focused blog) was given both explicit and coded threats of military force against the Holy See.

In January, behind closed doors at the Pentagon, Under Secretary of War for Policy Elbridge Colby summoned Cardinal Christophe Pierre — Pope Leo XIV’s then-ambassador to the United States — and delivered a lecture.

“America,” Colby and his colleagues told the cardinal, “has the military power to do whatever it wants in the world. The Catholic Church had better take its side.”

As tempers rose, one U.S. official reached for a fourteenth-century weapon and invoked the Avignon Papacy, the period when the French Crown used military force to bend the bishop of Rome to its will.

JD Vance, a Catholic himself, has done a pretty rare thing for the Trump admin and said they're gonna get to the bottom of it first, instead of immediately dismissing it as fake news.. This doesn't confirm it as real, but that it wasn't immediately denied and dismissed like the typical M.O. is quite interesting.

This could help explain why Pope Leo has felt so emboldened to speak up against Trump's war efforts in Iran, cause the administration officials have been warmongering against them behind the scenes. The chance that the admin actually pulls the trigger and attacks the Vatican is obviously low, but that they keep threatening many of our allies both publically and privately seems quite concerning to me. It also opens up a new thing to consider, how many other allies are they threatening behind closed doors too?

This could help explain why Pope Leo has felt so emboldened to speak up against Trump's war efforts in Iran

Trump went so far as to say that he was planning to wipe out the entire civilization of Iran. Of course the pope spoke out against him. It requires no behind closed doors activities to explain his willingness to be vocal about this war.

Trump went so far as to say that he was planning to wipe out the entire civilization of Iran. Of course the pope spoke out against him.

A majority of popes would have considered this an unequivocal good. Indeed, several of them have tried to do it themselves.

This would be news to most historians. Could you name me one?

Urban II, Eugene II, Gregory VIII, Innocent III, Honorius III, Gregory IX, Innocent IV…

Which of these called a crusade against the Khwarazmian Empire?

Presumably all the ones in and around the Crusades? I think the above comment was silly but I imagine there were many popes who wanted to (medieval equivalent) glass the middle east.

Are the Knight’s Templar currently bombing Iran? What’s going on today isn’t a religious war.

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