Trump’s Pope Post Shows His Unholy Narcissism

 https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/trump-pope-post-shows-his-unholy-narcissism.html

Now it seems his self-inflation could extend from this world into the next. A few days after attending the funeral of Pope Francis, Trump suggested he’d love to be the Holy Father’s successor. This was universally reported as a “joke,” albeit a tasteless one given the proximity of Francis’s death and the late pontiff’s well-advertised disdain for Trump’s policies and values. But then came the jump-the-shark moment: On May 2, Trump posted an image of himself in full papal regalia to Truth Social, which was then shared on the White House X feed. Hilarious, eh?

Unless I missed it, the humor was lost on many actual Roman Catholics. Embarrassed silence was the reaction typical of the conservative Catholics most likely to differ with Francis’s low opinion of Trump. The president’s friend Cardinal Timothy Dolan of New York didn’t even remain silent, saying, “It wasn’t good. As Italians say, it was brutta figura” (embarrassing).

Other New York Catholics expressed cold fury:

What this episode shows most clearly is that Trump either doesn’t care any more about offending sensibilities or is relying on loyalists like Vance to brush off criticism. In any event, it should serve as a note of caution to those who assume this administration and its congressional vassals will bend to adverse public opinion. Trump saw an opportunity to “own the Catholics” and didn’t hesitate to take it.