The Vatican has in its long and storied history canonized many saints. The process is long, involving good works, miracles, and divine inspiration. Not just anyone can be confirmed, but politics, ambition, and currying favor - common in the selection of popes and cardinals - are left aside when considering canonization.
Beatification, the first step to sainthood is a recognition of a person's entrance into heaven and their capacity to intercede on behalf of thise who pray in their name. In some rare cases, like the Franciscan missionary Don Pedro Sula, a conditional beatification is accorded in life - a recognition of those special Christian qualities of love, compassion, and faith which are qualifications for eventual sainthood.
Don Pedro had been recognized as 'saintly' even as a young man, 'a perfect soul in harmony with God', 'a model of rectitude and holy purpose'. He, like Pope Francis and his successor Pope Leo had worked tirelessly in the slums of Latin America, and had showed his divine promise in recognized works of mercy.
Although Don Pedro had never made the final vetting for sainthood, he was still revered by millions of the marginalized poor in the slums of Caracas, and recognized by many within the Catholic world.
When Pope Leo XIV within days of his investiture mentioned the American President in a prayer from the Vatican balcony, overlooking St. Peter's square, theologians and politicians took note. Why had Leo singled out Donald Trump, a man whom many had considered the very incarnation of Satanic purpose? What geopolitical accords were being formulated?
Critics of course were quick to allude to the Hollywood movie Godfather III in which Don Corleone makes an offer the Vatican could not refuse, one which would consolidate the power of both; but the Vatican demurred saying nothing of the sort. The Holy Father was only noting the President's principled stance on the right to life, God-given sexual identity, and the demission of gays and transgenders from prominence and credibility in American life.
The Pope's spokesman explained that the new pontiff, for all his familiar concern for the poor and disadvantaged, was as doctrinaire as his predecessors Benedict and John Paul II. The Church would simply not abide by the rush to sexual secularism and abandonment of the 6th commandment, Thou Shalt Not Kill.
Not only that, the new Pope admired President Trump's reinvigorated championing of individualism. The Church fathers had all understood the personal, dynamic relationship between the individual and God - faith was a personal, individual matter of confession, penance, and forgiveness and had nothing to do with a communitarian spirit.
While the gospels were filled with tales of Jesus's love for the poor and respect for those of charity and compassion, the doctrinal center of the Church was individual redemption. Jesus would help - his death on the cross was an act of forgiveness for the sins of the world - but that did not exonerate individuals of future generations.
The two men - the Pope and the President - talked often on the phone, each praising the other for their patriotism - Leo's profound faithfulness to God and Trump's dedication to America - and in the short weeks since his selection, the Pope had gone out of his way to congratulate Trump and to join in a willing partnership. Both men were inalterably moral in their approach to life and such an alliance would only be good for the world.
Trump, a Protestant, welcomed the words of the Pope and thanked him for his generosity. Although not a Catholic, he had always respected the institution which had been the foundation for the civilizing enterprise of empire. By extension, it was the President's hope, as it was Leo’s, that the Church would wean Africans off their tree-worshipping totemism, and bring them into the community of Christian nations.
Trump had never been a supporter of Africa, a continent mired in tribalism and corruption since independence. Since all else had failed in attempts to pull the continent into the socio-political mainstream, a Christian spiritual renovation might be just the thing.
The two men, therefore, were of the same ilk, intention and purpose - the dignity of life, the sanctity of reproduction, the respect and devotion to a higher authority, a bending to His will, and the enabling of the individual to perform in the spirit of divine inspiration - and a collaborative friendship was established firmly and early on.
'A mensch', said the Pope to his inner circle, referring to the President in the American Jewish vernacular he had learned during a clerical sojourn in New York. 'He holds the key'.
The key to what the Cardinals wondered? There was nothing particularly saintly about the American President, and so certainly was not the key to celestial paradise as the pontiff seemed to feel.
The key to expansion of Catholic influence, already under serious threat by the Protestant evangelism so roundly condemned by John Paul II? Possibly, for born-again-ism, that ignorant expression of faith without reason, that holy roller ecstatic nonsense, was making significant inroads into the Church's presence throughout the world.
It didn't matter, for the Pope and the President, both moral leaders and managers of institutional enterprise, were the ones to decide these matters.
Bobby and Don (they both, despite the august positions they both held, were old-fashioned Americans after all) talked often about baseball, the NBA playoffs, and the coming fall football season. They had quickly become buddies and co-religionists who could count on each other to do the right thing.
The new pope, however, sensed something more profound and inspiring in the President - a kind of American nativism which struck a special chord in this native Chicagoan who had always admired Carl Sandburg:
Hog Butcher for the World,
Tool Maker, Stacker of Wheat,Player with Railroads and the Nation's Freight Handler;Stormy, husky, brawling,City of the Big ShouldersLaughing the stormy, husky, brawling laughter of Youth, half-naked, sweating, proud to be Hog Butcher, Tool Maker, Stacker of Wheat, Player with Railroads and Freight Handler to the Nation.
It was this fundamental, patriotic Americanism which, even more than faith was the basis for a sincere friendship and the spontaneous consideration by the Pope of the spiritual promise of the man in the White House.
So, with the help of theologians and Church historians, Leo reviewed the case of Don Pedro Sula and his conditional beatification and found that he was not the only one recognized by the Vatican for the honor. Aloysius P Heinrich, an Austrian juggler who transformed the circus into a spiritual lesson was another. With mounting evidence, Leo built a strong case for the spiritual recognition of Donald Trump.
As of this writing, no formal proclamation has been announced by the Vatican and none are expected until the papacy is firmly grounded; but inside sources say that Leo is committed to the process, and that pre-beatification of the President is virtually assured.
When these rumors circulated in Washington, the expected howls of disbelief and virtual horror came from the Left, but Karoline Levitt, the President's Press Secretary made oblique but clear references to the legitimacy of the claims and expressed her hope that all Americans, Catholic or otherwise, would recognize this latest feather in the President's cap.
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