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Heritage Foundation Dog Walks Bishops into Photo with Trump

Heritage Foundation Dog Walks Bishops into Photo with Trump

Last updated on: October 26, 2026 at 10:16 am by Rebecca Hamilton

Heritage Foundation Dog Walks Bishops into Photo with Trump 2026-10-26T10:16:35-06:00 Rebecca Hamilton

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Trump. Source: Wikimedia Commons, White House file photo, public domain

If you dance with the devil, the devil don’t change. The devil changes you.

Line from the movie 8MM

Well hell.

That is literally what I thought when I saw the photo.

Our American bishops just can’t get it through their skulls that they have zero anointing to play power politics.

They’ve lived their lives in a free America with sane presidents who weren’t baby-raping, extortionist psychopaths. They’re evidently still living in the world of yesteryear when the president believed in America, wanted to build instead of tear down, and had respect for God.

They’re like a lot of Americans. They cannot wrap their little minds around the horror show we’ve put in power over this country. They also can’t grok that they’ve got some very nasty, ruthless “friends” in the Catholic power politics sphere.

The Heritage Foundation evidently dog-walked 8 of our bishops into a meeting with Trump. Trump proceeded to get a photo of them praying over him and looking for all the world like they were putting the imprimatur of the Catholic Church on every evil thing he does.

Two of these bishops have been man enough to come out and publicly admit that they were manipulated and used. They’ve issued public apologies for allowing themselves — and the Church along with them — to be used.

I respect the fact that they had the guts to issue public apologies. That was exactly the right way to handle this. It’s necessary for the continued witness to Christ of the Church and the public belief in the legitimacy of the moral voice of the Church.

The other bishops in that photo need to do the same thing. They need to get out in front of this thing and man up.

This is serious stuff.

If We the People don’t manage to stop Trump with our votes, or if he doesn’t keel with a stroke or a heart attack, Trump could very well go down as one of the great monsters of history. The things he’s doing are leading to a black hole of suffering, destruction and death. He could end up killing millions of people.

Whatever happens, that photo is going to be used by the enemies of Christ and the Church to “prove” that following Christ has no meaning in real life. Generations of people have seen the photo of Catholic bishops saluting Hitler. This is the same kind of thing.

The message this photo will used to portray is an ugly one.

Enemies of Christ will ask what’s the point of being a Christian if Christians don’t care if powerful men rape kids?What’s the point of following morality when the bishops endorse moral depravity? What’s the point of being Catholic if Catholic bishops bow down before Herod?

That’s the message people who attack the Church and Christianity will attach to that photo.

The Catholic Church is the White Whale of Christianity. This isn’t a photo of a bunch of hayseed, self-made, screaming and shouting clergy from small denominations praying and wailing over Trump. This is eight of the American Catholic bishops. This is The Church.

So yeah, this is a big deal. Trump wanted that photo to put out among the gullible and the not-too-involved Catholics to tell them that he has the endorsement of the Catholic Church. The whole point of that meeting was the photo.

I think Donald Trump is a moral degenerate. I think he’s a sexual predator. I think he raped kids. I think he’s in Putin’s pocket. I think he’s taking bribes.

But I have a very healthy respect for his abilities to co-opt people and use them. I think he is an absolute Svengali in his ability to corrupt people, destroy their morals and twist them into his willing puppets.

He has made himself into a false idol who has replaced Christ in the hearts of millions of “christians.”

I do not understand what the bishops thought they were going to accomplish by talking to this guy.

Nothing that they have to say means anything to Donald Trump. I’ve never known anyone I thought was as protected by satan as I think that Trump appears to be. But I have known my share of highly successful manipulating psychopaths.

People like that don’t look at other human beings and see another person. They see prey. They don’t care what you think. They don’t care what you feel. All they care about is how they can use you to get what they want.

I don’t think Trump cares about the bishop’s moral teaching. What he cares about is their power to influence the votes of Catholics.

He didn’t meet with them to negotiate with them. He had them there to get that photo so that he could use it to get hispanics to vote for their own destruction. He wanted that photo to convince Catholic women that they have to support rapists.

He wanted a photo of the bishops praying over him. He needed that photo as a tool to leverage the power of the bishops to influence the votes of Catholics to give him the power to continue with his unholy agenda of hate, greed, lies and destruction.

The bishops are very intelligent, well-educated men. But they are totally out of their depth dealing with someone like Trump.

I’ve read that people from the Heritage Foundation called the bishops and got them to attend this meeting. That’s the Project 2025 Heritage Foundation. Project 2025 is the blue print that Trump is following to dismantle and destroy this country.

Project 2025 is the enemy of just about every bit of the Church’s social teaching. I could enumerate the ways in which Project 2025 attacks both the Gospel teachings of Christ and the Church’s social teaching, but it would take several blog posts. It’s the apotheosis of the “oppose abortion and kill anybody else you want” morality of today’s right wing.

These bishops have got some nasty-mean “friends” and their nasty-mean friends dog walked them into the Oval Office. They served them up.

From The Guardian:

“We should never have been put in that position by the White House,” wrote Grob, adding that he had harbored reservations and “wish I had heeded them”.

Bishop Joensen wrote that “many things tied to this present Administration” were “blatantly at odds with our Catholic faith”.

He said none of the bishops was unaware the meeting fell close to an election, but insisted that none had intended to endorse a party or candidate. “I wish I had been more shrewd and less simple, like those who exploited our meeting for partisan political purposes.”

Grob said the Heritage Foundation, the conservative think tank behind the Project 2025 rightwing blueprint for the second Trump administration, arranged the meeting. The bishops, he said, were told it would be a private discussion of immigration enforcement, religious-worker visas and human dignity, with a possible chance to pray privately with the president.

After 90 minutes with domestic policy staff, they were ushered into the Oval Office, handed commemorative tokens and, Grob detailed, directed to stand behind Trump’s desk and pray. Nobody told them a video was being recorded, he said, and they never agreed to its release.

Joensen said officials connected to the White House Faith Office invited him, and that the agenda also covered fertility treatment incentives, abortion-inducing drugs and tax credits for private schools.

Archbishop James Golka of Denver, another participant, told his archdiocese’s publication that he understood why many saw the video as an endorsement but that it was “never my intention”. “I’m heartbroken that people are hurt, and that there are people intentionally using this moment to sow disunity,” he said.

Bishop Scott Bullock of Rapid City told the National Catholic Reporter that a Heritage Foundation representative had invited him and that the US Conference of Catholic Bishops was “not unaware” of the meeting. He did not say who in the leadership knew.

From A Public Apology – Archbishop Jeffrey Grob

… So, following a 90-minute discussion with White House domestic policy staff and advisors, we were eventually ushered into the Oval Office. The president greeted us, took a seat at his desk and presented us with commemorative tokens. We were then directed to stand behind him and pray. After which several photos were taken and we were ushered out. Unbeknownst to the group of bishops a video was also taken. But permission for the public distribution or posting of either the video or photos was not given by the bishops.

It did not take long thereafter for the White House to post a video and photos of the prayer.

…I feel a heavy sadness, not only over the pain I caused, but also for the fact that something so sacred to a group of religious leaders, prayer to our Heavenly Father, would be manipulated in that way. We came in good faith to try to work for the betterment of our fellow human beings, to ease their suffering, to build up the common good, and to pray with a president, not to pose for a political photo opportunity to benefit the few. We should never have been put in that position by the White House. I did not go without reservations. I wish I had heeded them.

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