|
 Trump struck back. No stranger to controversy, the longtime party
front-runner in national opinion polls dismissed the leader of the
world's Roman Catholics as "disgraceful" for questioning his faith.
He said he was a proud Christian.
Francis told reporters during a free-wheeling conversation on his
flight home from a visit to Mexico: "A person who thinks only about
building walls, wherever they may be, and not building bridges, is
not Christian."
Trump has accused Mexico of sending rapists and drug-runners across
the United States' southern border and has vowed if elected
president to build a wall to keep out immigrants who enter
illegally.
It was not the first time U.S. allies have voiced concern over
comments by Trump.
More than half a million Britons signed a petition to bar him from
entering Britain, where he has business interests, in response to
his call to temporarily ban Muslims from entering the United States.
British lawmakers decided against a ban as a violation of free
speech.
Asked if American Catholics should vote for someone with Trump's
views, Francis said: "I am not going to get involved in that. I say
only that this man is not Christian if he has said things like that.
We must see if he said things in that way and in this I give the
benefit of the doubt."
 It remained to be seen if the pope's comments would strengthen Trump
in the run-up to the Nov. 8 election to succeed Democratic President
Barack Obama. Trump's swipes at rival candidates and heated
exchanges with others have bolstered his standing in nominating
contests and opinion polls.
One of Trump's Republican rivals, former Florida Governor Jeb Bush,
speaking in Columbia, South Carolina, said he would not question
anyone's relationship with God. But Bush, a Catholic, said: "It only
enables bad behavior when someone from outside our country talks
about Donald Trump."
ISLAMIC STATE
Trump, a real estate developer and former reality TV show host,
said: "If and when the Vatican is attacked by ISIS, which as
everyone knows is ISIS' ultimate trophy, I can promise you that the
pope would have only wished and prayed that Donald Trump would have
been president." ISIS is one of the acronyms used for Islamic State.
Trump was in South Carolina, which on Saturday will hold a
Republican nominating contest.
At a later town hall meeting televised on CNN, Trump said he had "a
lot of respect" for Francis but that the pope had been influenced by
hearing only Mexico's side of the border issue. The pope's statement
also had been exaggerated by the media, he said.
"I think he said something much softer than it was originally
reported by the media. I think that he heard one side of the story,
which is probably by the Mexican government," he said. "He didn’t
see the tremendous strain that the border is causing us with respect
to illegal immigration, with the drugs pouring across the border."
Thomas Groome, director of the Boston College Center on the Church
in the 21st Century, said Francis' comments were entirely in keeping
with his focus on mercy.
“The pope is commissioned to preach the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
That’s his job,” Groome said. “So when he was asked a direct
question, he gave Trump the benefit of the doubt, he said we have to
be sure he said this, but if he said this, it is not Christian.”
Groome called Trump’s suggestion that Islamic State militants would
target the Vatican egregious. "Now it becomes a challenge to ISIS,”
he said.
Patrick Hornbeck, chairman of the department of theology at Fordham
University in New York, said Francis’ words were not surprising
given the poverty he had just seen in Mexico.
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“There is very little common ground between Pope Francis and Donald
Trump,” Hornbeck said. He predicted the pope’s words on electoral
politics would have little effect on any U.S. Catholics who liked
Trump as a candidate.
'A POLITICAL PERSON'
Trump has said he would deport millions of illegal immigrants if he
wins the White House. Last week, responding to the pope's plan to
visit the U.S.-Mexican border, he said Pope Francis did not
understand the issues.
"The pope is a very political person ... I don't think he
understands the danger of the open border that we have with Mexico,"
Trump told the Fox Business Network.
Asked about being called a "political person," Francis said on
Thursday: "Thank God he said I was a politician because Aristotle
defined the human person as 'animal politicus.' So at least I am a
human person."
Republican Catholics appear to support Trump more than other
Republicans do, according to a Reuters/Ipsos opinion poll that
showed 43 percent of likely Republican Catholic voters supported
Trump, compared with 38 percent of Republican voters generally.
The Pew Research Center has said 71 percent of the U.S. population
identifies as Christian. That includes the 21 percent of the U.S.
population that identifies as Catholic.
The pope was winning the social media battle on Thursday, with
overall sentiment negative for Trump and positive for Francis,
according to social media analytic firm Zoomph. Author Dan Dicker
@Dan_Dicker tweeted: "Let's see @realDonaldTrump insult his way out
of this."
Trump's social media director, Dan Scavino @DanScavino tweeted:
"Amazing comments from the Pope - considering Vatican City is 100
percent surrounded by massive walls."
Evangelical Christian leader Jerry Falwell Jr., who has endorsed
Trump, described him as generous to his employees and family,
adding: "I'm convinced he's a Christian. I believe he has faith in
Jesus Christ."
Trump was not always at odds with the pope. In 2013, the year
Francis began his papacy, Trump compared himself to the pope
favorably. “The new Pope is a humble man, very much like me, which
probably explains why I like him so much!” Trump tweeted on
Christmas Day 2013.
(Reporting by Emily Flitter and Steve Holland in South Carolina and
Philip Pullella aboard the papal plane; Additional reporting by
Anjali Athavaley, Susan Heavey, Chris Kahn, Scott Malone, Emily
Stephenson, Amy Tennery, Mohammad Zargham and John Whitesides;
Writing by Howard Goller and John Whitesides; Editing by Toni
Reinhold and Peter Cooney)
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reserved.]
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