John Paul II Helped Bring Down Communism. Will Leo XIV Be Trumpism's Nemesis?

Whether the new American pope has the willingness and courage to take on Trumpism is for him to choose. He certainly has the platform.

Newly ordained Augustinian priest Prevost meets John Paul II, 1982

Donald Trump is no longer the most important American in the world. As of May 8, the notoriously narcissistic president must share that space with a Chicagoan, Robert Francis Prevost, of whom hardly anybody had heard previously. That’s when “Bob,” as he is known among family and friends, became Pope Leo XIV.

The election of Roman Catholicism’s first American pope not only took almost everyone by surprise, but comes at an interesting turn in history, when right-wing populism threatens democracy worldwide, but, crucially, in the country that has acted as democracy’s beacon for a quarter of a millennium. Can the new pontiff, long an advocate for human rights and ethical behavior, act as a moral force to counter autocracy’s growing strength? Even its nemesis? Recent history offers insights.

Karol Józef Wojtyła was elected as the 264th pope, John Paul II, in June 1978, a few weeks after I was inducted into the U.S. Foreign Service. As a young man whose academic and professional life focused on history and geopolitics, I was fascinated with this first Polish pontiff, who had toughed it out under the brutal Nazi occupation and communist oppression of his homeland. His elevation to the papacy electrified Poles. His subsequent challenges to the communist system gave impetus to a movement that would lead to its collapse not only in Poland but throughout the East Bloc, a series of events to which I would have a ringside view.

“Let your spirit come down and change the face of the earth, of this earth,” John Paul II proclaimed in his sermon during his first visit to Poland after becoming pope. Poles responded enthusiastically to this papal rock star, who heard it as a call for ethical renewal and a transformation of society.

This leadership of conscience transcended borders. I witnessed its culmination when working on European affairs at the State Department from 1989 through 1991, when 12 European Soviet Bloc nations and Albania threw off communist regimes and six republics emerged from the dissolved Yugoslavia. Years later, Mikhail Gorbachev observed, “The collapse of the Iron Curtain would have been impossible without John Paul II.”

Having followed these “velvet revolutions” closely, I can say today that no one back then could measure John Paul II’s moral force or see where it would lead. While our government and many others were in regular contact with the pontiff and his people, there was no plan, no agenda for the liberation of European nations from communism. Policymakers were in as much surprise and awe as the rest of the world at the momentum and speed at which events took place, and they had a hard time keeping pace in formulating policies, much of which was done via urgent phone calls among leaders.

The lesson here is that overwhelming moral force trumps decades of careful and clever policy mapping, intelligence operations and public diplomacy. And, often in history, it is one individual who makes it all happen.

Much speculation is going on as to whether Pope Leo XIV could be such a man. The papal conclave unexpectedly selected an American just as the United States is dangerously succumbing to authoritarianism with the danger that other nations will follow. Coincidence? Just such a conclave chose a Pole in a period that would prove to be the end stage of communist rule in Europe. Coincidence or intentional? Vaunted Vatican secrecy keeps such decision-making from the outside world.

Leo’s election is “not a political statement” by the College of Cardinals, “but it contains a political message,” Massimo Faggioli, a papal expert and professor of theology and religious studies at Villanova University, told NPR. The “Trump effect” on America and the international global order, Faggioli added, is one of the things that “made the impossible possible.”

Indications are that Pope Leo XIV holds views of American values that contrast starkly with those of Trump and his America First agenda.

An “X” account in the name of Robert Prevost of Chicago shared posts critical Trump’s and Vance’s stances on a number of issues, including immigration, gun control, climate change and Christianity.

“We need to hear more from leaders in the Church, to reject racism and seek justice,” the account posted in May 2020.

Earlier this year, he posted a link to an article titled, “JD Vance is wrong: Jesus doesn’t ask us to rank our love for others.”

In 2015, Prevost posted a link to a Washington Post op-ed titled “Cardinal Dolan: Why Donald Trump’s anti-immigrant rhetoric is so problematic.”

Also in 2015, he tweeted, “It’s time to end the death penalty.”

He also shared an article critiquing Vance’s statements on migrant deportations and retweeted criticism of Trump’s and Salvadorian President Nayib Bukele’s response to the deportation of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a resident of Maryland.

He has also opposed cuts to foreign aid, domestic welfare programs and environmental protection.

John Prevost, the pope’s brother, told the NYT that he did not think his brother would shy away from voicing his disagreements with the president. “I know he’s not happy with what’s going on with immigration,” he said. “I know that for a fact. How far he’ll go with it is only one’s guess, but he won’t just sit back. I don’t think he’ll be the silent one.”

The new pope appeared to confirm his brother’s assertion in an interview last fall: “The bishop is not supposed to be a little prince sitting in his kingdom, but rather called authentically to be humble, to be close to the people he serves, to walk with them, to suffer with them, and to look for ways that he can better live the Gospel message in the midst of his people.”

Like his immediate predecessor, Leo stems from a more progressive, inclusive wing of Catholicism, preaching peace and the need to build bridges. And like, John Paul II, he has the bully pulpit to preach human rights and freedom from oppression. That said, there are signs that he cleaves more closely to traditional Catholic views on abortion, homosexuality and women’s roles in the church.

He has nonetheless the potential to act as a counterweight to Trumpism at a time when America’s role as, in the words of Abraham Lincoln, “the last best hope of earth” may be coming to its end. Pope Leo certainly has the potential to become a global rival to Trump, as a man who has the gravitas to influence Catholic Republicans more than any of his predecessors had and speak with a voice that resonates powerfully among all Americans.

The NYT’s David Brooks recently offered an apt description of Donald Trump that I find striking. He is a “pagan” who celebrates “power, manliness, conquest, ego, fame, competitiveness and prowess, and it is those values that have always been at the core of Trump’s being — from his real estate grandiosity to his love of pro wrestling to his king-of-the-jungle version of American greatness.” In other words, all the values that are in contradiction to Jesus’s teachings.

Just as communism was during John Paul II’s time.

Whether the new American pope has the willingness and courage to take on the new paganism is for him to choose. He certainly has the platform.

The opinions and characterizations in this article are those of the author, and do not necessarily represent official positions of the U.S. government.