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It’s past midnight, and I’m running on fumes, but I can’t close my laptop tonight without writing this down.

Today was one of the most important days in the history of American Catholicism and, I believe, in the life of this country.

After yesterday’s sadness — watching the president of the United States go after the Bishop of Rome in public — the Church rose up in a single voice to defend Pope Leo XIV.

Bishops across the country issued statements within hours. Inboxes, group chats, radio call-in lines, and television green rooms filled up with a single message from millions of lay Catholics: hands off our pope.

I spent the day bouncing between television hits, radio spots, print interviews, and livestreams. The same question kept coming from every host and every reporter, in different words but always the same question at heart: why would Donald Trump do this?

I gave the same answer every time. The answer is jealousy.

Harry Enten laid it out with clinical precision on CNN today, in numbers so lopsided they explain everything.

Pope Leo XIV sits at a net plus thirty-four with the American public. Donald Trump is underwater at minus twelve — a gap of nearly fifty points in favor of the pope. NBC News tested Leo against every major public figure in the country, and Leo came out the most popular person tested. “I believe the president is making a humongous mistake,” Enten said, “going after the most popular guy in America.”

Then Enten turned to the number Trump should actually be afraid of. In November 2024, Trump beat Kamala Harris among U.S. Catholics by twenty points. One year into his second term, his net approval with Catholics is minus four.

That is a twenty-four-point collapse with the voters who got him back into the White House. Going after the pope won’t heal those numbers — it will accelerate their collapse.

But jealousy is only half the diagnosis. The other half is political math, and it’s the part of this story that conservative Catholic friends need to hear.

As I told Mike Nellis and Mike Madrid on our livestream today, there is a revealing detail buried inside the last forty-eight hours.

Trump posted two tweets: one that enraged Catholics and one that enraged evangelicals. He deleted the tweet that enraged evangelicals. The one mocking Pope Leo XIV stayed up.

There is only one honest explanation for that choice. MAGA Catholics have zero influence over President Trump. He cares about what evangelicals think, and nothing else.

The coalition conservative Catholics thought they were joining does not defend them when it counts, and it certainly does not defend their pope.

I want to say this as gently as I can to our conservative Catholic friends: the movement you trusted to protect the Church just mocked her shepherd to his face, and the men you elevated to power would not lift a finger to stop it.

Come home. There is a Catholic community in this country ready to defend Pope Leo XIV without flinching and without apology, and we would be honored to walk with you.

As I said today with Scott MacFarlane, today’s unity had nothing to do with partisanship. It was a pastoral moment — the whole Church recognizing her shepherd and refusing to let him be disgraced.

And as I put it in another appearance with Ben Mieselas, this is what the Church looks like when she remembers who she is: Catholics who disagree on liturgy, on immigration, on the 2024 election, closing ranks around a pope they recognize as their own.

Yesterday was a sad day. Today was an uplifting one. The whole Church came together to uphold the dignity of our shepherd, and the experience was unifying in a way I have not felt in years.

The anger has had its day. Now comes the organizing.

Our petition demanding that President Trump apologize to Pope Leo XIV made it into Newsweek tonight, with 22,000 signatures and growing by the hour.

If you haven’t signed yet, please do — and please share it with everyone you know.

Public pressure works, and the number of names on that page matters more than any cable hit I did today.

Every signature is a small act of public defiance against a White House that believes it can insult the Holy Father and move on.

American Catholics will protect Pope Leo XIV.

Standing alongside us will be Christians of every other tradition who love this man’s voice for the poor and the hunted, along with Jews and Muslims and secular Americans of goodwill who recognize a moral leader when they see one.

Together, we will defend his good name, his ministry, his life, and his right as Bishop of Rome to speak the truth of the Gospel without being menaced by warlords in suits and insignia.

To the anti-Catholic and authoritarian forces in MAGA and around the world — in the Pentagon, in the White House, and in the Bannon-Epstein networks that have been gunning for Leo and his beloved predecessor Francis for a decade — I am telling you now, on behalf of this community and the millions more like it: we will defeat you.

At Letters from Leo, we stand with Pope Leo XIV and the millions of Americans — Catholics and people of every faith and none — who refuse to let the Pentagon or the White House bully the conscience of the world.

In an era when the warlords of our government treat the Bishop of Rome like a problem to be managed and dismiss the Gospel as an obstacle to empire, we are building something more stubborn than their cruelty: a movement rooted in human dignity, love for the poor, and the conviction that no empire outlasts the truth of Christ.

This is the fastest-growing Catholic community in the country because people are hungry for a faith that refuses to bow before power.

If you believe protecting Pope Leo XIV from the bullies threatening him is part of protecting what is best about both the Church and this country, I am asking you to join us.

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Thank you for reading. I’ll see you on the road.

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