Behold, I bring you Donald Jesus

By Alfred P. Doblin

It was only a matter of time. America had been fooled long enough. The “J” in Donald J. Trump did not stand for John, but rather Jesus.

Such revelations between Easter and Pentecost are rare indeed, but we live in extraordinary times. After feuding with Pope Leo XIV for objecting to war, destruction, and the dehumanization of individuals regardless of culture or faith, President Trump took to Truth Social, a website whose name the pope noted was ironic, and posted an image of himself as Jesus.

The president denies he was depicting himself as Jesus, that such assumptions are just another example of “fake news,” deranged Trump syndrome (goodness, another irony) gone amuck. According to the president, he was showing himself as a doctor healing the sick.

The image had Trump in a white robe with a red cloak, while holding an orb emitting golden light in his left hand. With his right hand on the sick person’s head, he is not healing them through his divine power, but rather asking whether they had private health insurance or Obamacare.

Now perhaps I have had it wrong all these years going to doctors who dressed like… well, doctors. I’m no billionaire. Maybe it’s different for them. Maybe there is a level higher than concierge for MDs? Disciple care? Acolyte? I always thought Mount Sinai doctors referred to the skilled medical teams working in a hospital with a flagship presence on upper Fifth Avenue, but I guess to the president, Mount Sinai was and is literal.

The president’s personal attacks on the pope are disturbing on so many levels, while I know there are thousands and thousands of victims of clerical sexual abuse who would chastise and condemn the leader of the Catholic Church, regardless of who it is. And Pope Leo would acknowledge that it is fair to condemn horrible, inexcusable lapses of moral authority by the Church. But condemning war and a lust for power and money is exactly what the pontiff should be doing.

It is what his recent predecessors did, and it is the lack of that in an aggressive public way during World War II that clouds the legacy of Pope Pius XII.

“These are the times that try men’s souls,” is the memorable opening of Thomas Paine’s aptly called The American Crisis. Paine was writing to the colonists in the early days of the American Revolution. It was a dark period, a time of panic. He wrote:

“‘Tis surprising to see how rapidly a panic will sometimes run through a country. All nations and ages have been subject to them…Yet panics, in some cases, have their uses; they produce as much good as hurt. Their duration is always short; the mind soon grows through them, and acquires a firmer habit than before. But their peculiar advantage is, that they are the touchstones of sincerity and hypocrisy, and bring things and men to light, which might otherwise have lain forever undiscovered… They sift out the hidden thoughts of man, and hold them up in public to the world.”

People tell us exactly who they are if only we listen. We are not that skilled in the act of subterfuge. The president certainly is not. Every day, he says who his is: He does not apologize. He does not admit defeat. He is never wrong.

But he is wrong.

Pope Leo is the leader of the Catholic Church. He is not the president’s rival. Yet, it is impossible to separate politics from daily life. It is politics that determine the course of nations, but without morality, the course is misdirected. That is where the pope’s voice is needed.

The Trump administration is peppered with professed Catholics, so I say, now is the moment when the rubber meets the road, and the knee hits the cold stone floor before the Blessed Sacrament.

American politicians too often want Catholicism to be all about sex, sexual orientation, and reproductive rights. Well, it’s also about human rights, human dignity, and a respect for the divine power and forgiveness of God.

The president’s attack on the pope is profoundly disturbing. And his posting of an image that portrays himself as a Jesus-like figure is morally reprehensible. There should be no silence in Washington or across the nation on this point. I’m no Catholic scholar, but here’s a recap of some of the tenets of the Ten Commandments:

No.1—I am the Lord thy God. No strange gods allowed. Trump failed that one.

No.2—Thou shall not take the Lord’s name in vain. Oops, he did it again.

No.3—Keep holy the Lord’s day. There was that Easter post with the profanities.

No.5—Thou shall not kill. Promising to destroy an entire civilization is problematic.

No.6—Thou shall not commit adultery. Enough said.

No.8—Thou shall not bear false witness. Oh, dear.

I left out a few, but on a test with a possible 10 correct answers, failing six is a no-pass. You fail.

I do not understand why there are not more people concerned about what the president says and does. Something is clearly not right – with him, and with us, as a country. It is not normative for anyone to depict themselves as Jesus unless they can prove their mother was named Mary and born without original sin.

Thomas Paine got it right in 1776 writing about the advantages of a time of panic – “they are the touchstones of sincerity and hypocrisy, and bring things and men to light, which might otherwise have lain forever undiscovered.”

No doctor wears a white robe with a red cloak. No doctor has a glowing orb in his left hand. This is not messianic; it is a mess.

It is our mess.

Until next time, this is Alfred with a P