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Catholic Cardinals Question Morality of Trump War Threats

Catholic Cardinals Question Morality of Trump War Threats

Last updated on: January 19, 2026 at 11:09 pm by Rebecca Hamilton

Catholic Cardinals Question Morality of Trump War Threats 2026-01-19T23:09:28-07:00 Rebecca Hamilton

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Berlin, after World War II. Source: Wikimedia Commons, public domain

Three of America’s Catholic Cardinals have spoken out against Trump’s repeated threats of global war directed against — of all people — our stalwart allies Norway, England, France and the other NATO nations.

Cardinals Blase Cupich of Chicago, Robert McElroy of Washington DC, and Joseph Tobin of New Jersey issued a joint statement based on Pope Leo’s recent address in which the Holy Father said that “war is back on vogue” and condemned “diplomacy based on force.”

Their statement said in part,

“We renounce war as an instrument for narrow national interests and proclaim that military action must be seen only as a last resort in extreme situations, not a normal instrument of national policy.

“We seek a foreign policy that respects and advances the right to human life, religious liberty, and the enhancement of human dignity throughout the world, especially through economic assistance.”

The impetus for this statement appears to be the latest of Trump’s insane threats against Norway. The Mad King sent a letter to our peaceable and inoffensive ally, telling them that since he had not received the Nobel Prize, peace was not something he had to consider.

Trump has made a fool of himself — something he does on a regular basis — by demanding that the Nobel Committee, which is situated in Oslo, Norway, present him with a Nobel Prize. He’s gotten foreign heads of state who are buttering him up so he will use the power of this country on their behalf to nominate him. Last week, the pathetic old fool even managed to get a woman who had legitimately won the Nobel Prize to “give” him her medal.

The Nobel Committee followed that bit of insanity by publicly stating that the honor of winning the Nobel Prize is not transferable. I wonder if that’s what set off the Mad King’s latest threat.

All I know is what he wrote, which was that he “no longer feels obliged to think only of peace” because he was “not awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.”

That reads like the school bully threatening to beat you up if you didn’t do his homework for him. Or, maybe, the local Mafia, threatening to kill your family because you didn’t pay them for “protection.”

Whatever example you want to use for an illustration, Trump told Norway that, since the Nobel Committee refused to award him with a Nobel Peace Prize, he would get even by using America’s military to invade and take over Greenland and, if that started a world war, it was ok with him.

Trump has persisted in this insanity despite the fact that fully 76% of the American people are opposed to it. Don’t ask me to explain the morals or thinking of the other 24%. I have ideas, but they aren’t pretty.

Even a few of Trump’s stooge Republicans in Congress are getting restive. But let’s not get excited about that. Other Republicans are authoring legislation to empower Trump to “annex” Greenland, and, everyone knows that Republicans always chicken out. They may grumble, but all Trump has to do is say “Boo!” and they’ll let him tear down the White House, murder shipwreck survivors on the high seas, back the murder of American citizens on our city streets, and, well, maybe we shouldn’t talk too much about the “gift” jet that he got from Qatar and the Air Force base on American soil that he gave them in return.

If you’re counting on todays whipped-dog Republicans in Congress to save this country, you probably are also still waiting for the Titanic to come sailing into New York Harbor.

European nations are not taking Trump’s threats as a joke. They’re arming and getting ready for combat.

America, and really the whole world, is in serious peril from the Mad King. Considering the magnitude of what we are dealing with, it may sound odd for me to say this, but I am so relieved to see the leaders of my church here in America actually make a move and say something about this.

I don’t expect this statement will weight much in Trump’s considerations. I don’t believe that Trump cares two sneezes in a tornado about the morality of what he does.

What I do think — and hope — is that this statement, along with the bishops’ earlier statement on immigration, could be the beginning of the Church in America rescuing itself from the ignominious fate awaiting the Evangelicals and other religious sell-outs to Trump and Christian Nationalism.

Trump doesn’t care about morality. But I do care. And I am not alone. Statements like these strengthen people in the necessary and difficult work of standing for what is morally right in the face of a government controlled by a tyrant.

I want the leaders of my Church to be shepherds who lead us pew sitters to Jesus and the moral good. I want very much to follow my Church. I want to believe in the leadership of my bishops. It’s been demoralizing, watching so many of our bishops play footsie with this evil regime. It’s heart-breaking to see them fail this test of faith so abysmally.

America’s Catholic bishops don’t have to do much to make their point. But they do need to signal once in a while that they are still in agreement with the pope and the Ten Commandments and that the Gospels outweigh right wing money and power in their reckoning.

I am outraged that anyone who claims to speak for Christ would conflate this morally degenerate mental case with Our Lord. But that is what has happened.

Christians in America elected Trump. Christians in America are the ones who are continuing to support Trump.

Christians in America excuse, deny and lie to deify and support every evil he commits. And they do it in the name of Christ. They equate selling out to this satanic evil — which any true follower of Christ is bound by their faith to oppose — with being a good Christian.

Christianity in America looks horrible.

Christianity in America looks evil.

Too many clergy of various denominations spell Jesus T-R-U-M-P. Too many of them are beguiled by the notion that fake fascist “christianity” under the guise of “Christian Nationalism” will put them in power and let them impose a kind of right wing “christian” sharia law on the American people.

These clergy aren’t advancing Christianity. They are tools that satan is using to destroy Christianity and drive people away from Christ.

I believe that there are influential proponents of this satanic destruction of the Christian message inside the Conference of Bishops. I can see it, even from the back pews where I sit.

I am so glad to see three Cardinals of the Church finally speaking up. All it took was the threat of a world war and the destruction of Western Civilization to get them to do it.

For too long our bishops as a group have been a living representation of the words by WB Yeats, The best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity.

Maybe that is changing.

All I know is that I have one thing to say to Cardinals Cupich, McElroy and Tobin, and that one thing is “Thank you.”

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