Pope Leo XIV has criticised leaders who spend billions on wars and said the world is being “destroyed by a handful of tyrants”. He made the statement during his visit to Cameroon.
He also condemned leaders who use religious rhetoric to justify wars and called for a “decisive change of course.”
“The masters of war pretend not to know that it takes only a moment to destroy, but often a lifetime is not enough to rebuild everything. They turn a blind eye to the fact that billions of dollars are spent on killing and destruction, but the resources needed for healing, education and reconstruction are nowhere to be found,” Reuters reported the pontiff as saying.
The statement came amid US President Donald Trump’s administration’s conflict with Leo XIV, who has repeatedly called for peace in the Middle East in his speeches.
On 6 April, Trump said he believes God supports US and Israeli actions against Iran because “God wants people to be taken care of”. “God doesn’t like what’s going on. I don’t like what’s going on either,” he said.
On 10 April, Leo XIV published a post on social media X in which he stated that “God does not bless any conflict.” “Anyone who is a disciple of Christ will never side with those who once took up the sword and today are dropping bombs,” he wrote.
On April 13, Trump published a post on his social network Truth Social, in which he criticised Pope Leo XIV because of the Vatican’s position on the issue of war with Iran. The American president said the pontiff is “weak on crime and terrible on foreign policy.”
“I don’t want a pope who thinks it’s OK for Iran to have nuclear weapons. I don’t want a pope who thinks it’s terrible that America attacked Venezuela, a country that was sending huge amounts of drugs to the United States… And I don’t want a pope who criticises the president of the United States for doing exactly what I was elected to do – by a resounding margin – setting record low crime rates and creating the largest stock market in history,” Trump wrote.
The American president also posted an artificial intelligence-generated image showing him in an image that resembled Jesus Christ. The post was later deleted and Trump himself said he believed he was shown as a Red Cross doctor.
Pope Leo XIV-U.S.-born Robert Francis Prevost. Last year, Trump hailed his election as pontiff, noting that he was the first US citizen to become a Roman pope. Following the president’s words, Leo XIV said he would not change his position on the war and was “not afraid” of criticism from the Trump administration.