One of the more alarming aspects of the Trump administration is the way it seeks to instrumentalize Christianity — both as a weapon against its political opponents and to reward its political supporters.
As protesters gathered on the front steps of the Supreme Court, the justices inside heard arguments in a Maryland case that could determine whether parents, due to their religious beliefs, have the right to pull their children out of classes that teach about gender and sexuality.
On May 15, Palestinians around the world will mark Nakba Day to remember the catastrophic events of Palestinian mass displacement. In years past, this day has largely flown under the radar. But this year feels different. After the atrocities committed by Hamas on Oct. 7, 2023, and in the wake of the state of Israel’s mass killing of Palestinian men, women, and children along with the staggering destruction of Gaza, the world can no longer look away. The question now is whether it will summon the courage to act.
R.O. Kwon, the bestselling novelist of The Incendiaries and Exhibit, does not believe in God. Even so, Kwon’s writing about God and faith feels more familiar to me than that of many who do believe.
As someone who very strongly believes in God, I find that kinship feels a little scary and a little dangerous. To avoid too much psychoanalyzing, it makes it feel like the waters between belief and unbelief are rather porous. This line of thought is tempting to run from, as all scary things are, but it’s here that I return to Kwon’s work.
Leo’s papacy comes at a time of tension between the Vatican and the Trump administration. A few months before he died, Pope Francis issued a letter to the church’s American bishops condemning the president’s approach to immigration and took direct aim at Vice President JD Vance’s attempts to use his Catholic faith to justify the administration’s deportation policies. Pope Leo XIV, then a cardinal, publicly agreed with Pope Francis and posted on social media that “JD Vance is wrong: Jesus doesn’t ask us to rank our love for others.”
Here’s what Pope Leo XIV has said over the years on a number of issues.
Conclave’s message goes beyond papal elections: Before I saw the film, I couldn’t have predicted just how shockingly relevant it would be to me and my experience as a trans person still doing my best to remain in relationship with the church.
Since graduating, I’ve largely tried to ignore all things related to Cornerstone. Whenever I would hear news about the school — whether it involved limiting intellectual freedom, disassembling the humanities department, or dismissing employees deemed to be insufficiently conservative or supportive of the president — it only served to confirm my ignorance-is-bliss approach. For a long time, whenever I was confronted with the fact that Cornerstone had only become more restrictive since I graduated, what came to mind was the first half of a quote from the writer James Baldwin: “Not everything that is faced can be changed …”
Until recently, the young women at the forefront of conservative politics were largely evangelical Protestants. They looked like the kind of young women you might see showing their OOTDs on RushTok, marrying a certain Southern-bred feminine aesthetic with a defense of President Donald Trump. These young women aren’t fading into the background during the start of the second Trump administration, but they now have company. Young Catholic women have emerged as instrumental messengers of the MAGA message.
Rev. Mark Francis, a friend of Prevost since the 1970s, told Reuters the cardinal was a firm supporter of his predecessor's papacy, and especially of the late pontiff's commitment to social justice issues.
"He was always friendly and warm and remained a voice of common sense and practical concerns for the Church's outreach to the poor," said Francis, who attended seminary with Prevost and later knew him when they both lived in Rome in the 2000s.
Cardinal Robert Prevost was elected in a surprise choice to be the new leader of the Catholic Church on Thursday, taking the name Leo XIV, becoming the first U.S. pontiff.