Big Red ☦️

BREAKING: Catholics all over the world call for Pope Leo to excommunicate J.D. Vance after it was revealed that the Trump Pentagon threatened the Vatican with the U.S. military. This is a fate worse than death for a devout Catholic... "Catholics around the globe are calling for JD Vance’s excommunication from the Catholic Church after he suggested Donald Trump could use nuclear weapons against Iran," Catholic commentator Christopher Hale of the "Letters from Leo" Substack reported yesterday. He shared a clip of Vance referring to "tools in our toolkit," seemingly alluding to Trump's threat to commit nuclear genocide against Iran, a horrific eventuality that was ultimately avoided by the tenuous ceasefire. Those calls for excommunication were then supercharged today when The Free Press revealed that Cardinal Christophe Pierre was summoned to the Pentagon in his role as the Holy See's Ambassador to the United States. During that meeting, Trump officials then berated him over the pope's criticisms of Trump's brutish foreign policy. At one point, a Trump official raised the specter of the Avignon Papacy, a period in the 14th century when the French King exploited his military to force the pope to live in Avignon. The term now serves as shorthand for direct state control over the Vatican. The implication seemed to be that Trump could exploit the U.S. military to intimidate Pope Leo into submission. When asked about the outrageous threat by a reporter earlier today, Vance first claimed not to know who Cardinal Pierre was, then insisted that he was not aware of the story and thus could not comment on it. Vance makes a great show of his adult conversion to Catholicism but displays none of the kindness, compassion, or charity that is supposed to define a follower of Christ. He's a black hole of cruelty, entitlement, and nihilism. If Leo did excommunicate Vance, it would bar the vice president from receiving the sacraments, most notably the Eucharist, the communion that Catholics believe to be the literal body and blood of Christ. He would be, in essence, exiled and removed from the Catholic faith. The canon laws governing excommunication are rigid and specific but two possible reasons are "schism" or attempting violence against the pope. If Vance endorses Trump's implicit threat to use the military against Leo either explicitly or through a failure to condemn it — that would likely qualify for both categories of violation. As Hale further reported, the bishops who have "direct authority over Vance’s canonical status in the Catholic Church" are Cardinal Robert McElroy and Archbishop Robert Casey. Both are capable of beginning excommunication proceedings. Ultimately, we of course defer to Pope Leo's judgement on this issue as he has proven himself to be one of the world's leading moral voices in these dark times. If you were the pope, how would you handle J.D. Vance and MAGA? Please ❤️ and share if you think that Vance is a fake Catholic!