The Pope v Trump
The Story
The Times
3.9 • 1.6K Ratings
🗓️ 15 April 2026
⏱️ 31 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Over the weekend, Donald Trump posted an image of himself as a Jesus Christ like figure, which was subsequently deleted. It came after the President and the Pope exchanged a war of words over the conflict in Iran. What’s behind this latest spat, and how could it affect Trump’s standing among American’s Christians?
This podcast was brought to you thanks to the support of readers of The Times and The Sunday Times. Subscribe today: http://thetimes.com/thestory
Guests:
- Kaya Burgess, science and religious affairs correspondent, The Times, and
- Christopher Hale, Democratic operative and author of Letters from Leo substack.
Host: Manveen Rana.
Producers: Edward Drummond.
We want to hear from you - email: thestory@thetimes.com
Read more: Trump’s row with Pope Leo could cost him dearly among Catholic voters
Clips: Times Radio, Fox News, Vatican News, 9News, BBC, Forbes, USA Today, CBS News.
Photo: Getty Images.
This podcast was brought to you thanks to subscribers of The Times and The Sunday Times. To enjoy unlimited digital access to all our journalism subscribe here.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | From the Times and the Sunday Times, this is the story. |
| 0:06.0 | I'm Manvine Rana. |
| 0:09.7 | In some ways, perhaps it shouldn't have been a surprise. |
| 0:14.3 | Donald Trump has form, having previously posted an image of himself as the Pope, |
| 0:18.7 | sitting in a throne-like chair, looking like he was |
| 0:22.2 | giving a blessing in full robes. And yet, when he posted an AI-generated image of himself on social |
| 0:28.8 | media, it was still a global marmalade dropper. And even more striking, if that's the right |
| 0:36.1 | word, image, very clearly depicting himself as Jesus Christ. |
| 0:40.1 | I mean, it looks like a sort of slightly mad Renaissance-era painting. |
| 0:43.9 | He's there in the centre with a flowing white robe. |
| 0:46.5 | He's glowing with light coming from the clouds behind him in various winged creatures coming out of the clouds. |
| 0:52.7 | He's holding an orb of light in one hand |
| 0:55.3 | and with the other hand, also with an orb of light laying his hand on the forehead of a sick |
| 1:00.7 | man in a bed. That image has now been taken down amid a torrent of outrage, including from |
| 1:09.0 | Trump supporters. I'm so grateful that, you know, many of us who reached out to the president to have this |
| 1:16.6 | picture, AI picture taken down, and it was taken down. |
| 1:21.6 | And so clearly it defends millions of Christians and Catholics all over the world. |
| 1:29.4 | There can't have been any doubt what the image was designed to depict. |
| 1:34.0 | I mean, I'm fascinated as to what the prompt must have been. |
| 1:36.8 | Anything other than please show me looking like Jesus would surprise me. |
| 1:41.8 | The image was published in a week when Donald Trump, clearly not busy enough with the war in |
| 1:47.8 | Iran, chose to take on a new adversary, the Pope. |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from The Times, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of The Times and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.