Pope Leo tells broadcasters to reject Trumpian war propaganda

In a speech to broadcasters this week, Pope Leo XIV rebuked wartime propaganda, which seemed like a pretty clear reference to Donald Trump’s administration.

Specifically, the pope reportedly spoke about portraying war as though it’s a video game — just days after the White House spliced video game images into some of its Iran war propaganda.

According to the National Catholic Register:

Speaking March 16 to the staff of the Italian state television program, TG2, the pope said it is up to journalists ‘to show the sufferings that war always brings to the people; to show the face of war and to relate it through the eyes of the victims, so as not to transform it into a video game.’

‘Always, but especially in the dramatic circumstances of war, such as those we are currently experiencing, the media must guard against the risk of becoming propaganda,’ Leo said. ‘And the task of journalists, in verifying the news so as not to become a mouthpiece for those in power, becomes even more urgent and delicate — I would say essential.’

The pope’s comments followed a similar denunciation from Chicago Cardinal Blase Cupich, who issued a statement condemning the Trump administration’s use of action movie and video game footage in its war propaganda.

“As more than 1,000 Iranian men, women and children lay dead after days of bombardment from U.S. and Israeli missiles, the official White House X account on Thursday evening posted a video of scenes from popular action movies spliced with actual strike footage from their war on Iran. The clip was captioned: ‘JUSTICE THE AMERICAN WAY,’” Cupich wrote on March 7.

“A real war with real death and real suffering being treated like it’s a video game — it’s sickening,” he added.

The statement was even shared by some conservative-leaning accounts on social media, underscoring the religious divisions Trump’s war has fueled in the MAGA movement.

These kinds of calls to conscience could prove quite resonant, as Trump’s deadly war wreaks havoc on the economy and faces widespread unpopularity in the United States.