Letters from Leo — the American Pope & US Politics

Letters from Leo — the American Pope & US Politics

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“Man of Faith” — Abdul El-Sayed Could Make History in Michigan on Tuesday
On 60 Minutes, Ross Douthat asked the Democrat why his Muslim faith stuck. His answers on God, Israel, and Michigan’s Jewish voters frame what is at…
 • Christopher Hale
“Machines Are Tools, Not Persons” — Pope Leo XIV Tells Silicon Valley Who Answers for AI
Seventeen days after lung surgery, the pope asked AI researchers at the Vatican to ban killer robots and reject AI personhood. Peter Thiel and Marc…
 • Christopher Hale
Pope Leo XIV Cast His Ballot. Before Tuesday, I’m Humbly Asking for Your Help.
Our Catholic voter guides have made their way to more than 100,000 Americans, and more than 10,000 have pledged to vote. With two days left, the Church…
 • Christopher Hale
Rejecting ‘Polite Religion,’ Pope Leo XIV’s Detroit Archbishop Joins ICE Vigil Days Before the Midterms
Archbishop Edward Weisenburger stood with immigrants in Clark Park on Friday, eight days after twelve bishops prayed over Trump. Days before the vote…
 • Christopher Hale
Pope Leo XIV Roots for Villanova Over Notre Dame, But Only as Robert Prevost
The first American pope keeps splitting himself in two. On Friday, the Vatican confirmed Robert Prevost had mailed his ballot home to Illinois.
 • Christopher Hale
Pope Leo is challenging MAGA authoritarianism. Get the story no one else is telling — free in your inbox.

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Pope Leo XIV Meets the Chicago Catholics Who Sued Trump to Minister to ICE Detainees
The Chicago delegation carried a banner quoting his call for a “holy rebellion” and handed him letters from detainees. Leo has now cast his own midterm…
 • Christopher Hale
Pope Leo XIV Requests a Mail Ballot to Vote in the Midterms
The Will County Clerk’s office confirmed this evening that the pope asked for his Illinois mail ballot on Oct. 3. Once he returns it, Leo will become…
 • Christopher Hale
Why Pope Leo XIV Wants Every Catholic to Vote
Francis called indifference “a cancer of democracy,” and Leo says Catholics cannot be “unengaged spectators.” With five days left, here is our voter…
 • Christopher Hale
Trump’s Catholic Approval Collapses to 30% Before the Midterms
Hispanic Catholics have fallen from 31% to 18%, and they now favor House Democrats 59 to 19. The collapse is landing in the Catholic suburbs and Latino…
 • Christopher Hale
JD Vance Attacked His Faith. Now Pastor Adam Hamilton Could Flip Kansas for the First Time Since 1932.
The Methodist preacher invited the vice president to church. His opponent, Sen. Roger Marshall, sued more than 700 of his own patients over medical…
 • Christopher Hale
“There Is No Such Thing as a Holy War” — Pope Leo XIV Rebukes the Iran War a Week Before the Midterms
Recovering from lung surgery, the pope sent a video to the 40th anniversary of John Paul II’s 1986 Assisi summit. JD Vance and Mike Johnson had tried to…
 • Christopher Hale
Pope Leo’s Mar-a-Lago Bishop Rebukes Trump’s Oval Office Photo Op
Bishop Manuel de Jesús Rodríguez says the Church backs no candidate, and Kansas City’s archbishop disowned his predecessor’s visit. Sources in Rome say…
 • Christopher Hale
Des Moines Bishop Says White House Exploited Trump Prayer Photo Op as Two of Twelve Now Express Regret
Bishop William Joensen says the White House exploited the Oval Office prayer. More than 2,500 Catholics now ask the ten silent bishops to follow him and…
 • Christopher Hale
Archbishop Grob Apologizes for Praying Over Trump, Accuses White House of Manipulating the Moment
Milwaukee’s archbishop accused the White House of manipulating a sacred prayer and posting the video without the bishops’ consent. He is the first of…
 • Christopher Hale
New York Nuns Rebuke the 12 Bishops Who Prayed Over Trump
Sisters of Charity, who have served immigrants since 1817, asked where the poor were in the Oval Office. More than 1,800 have signed our letter asking…
 • Christopher Hale
White House Takes Credit for Pope Leo XIV’s Oleshky Ceasefire
Three days after cancer surgery, the pope phoned Putin to seek a ceasefire in a starving Ukrainian city. A week later, with Trump’s Catholic approval at…
 • Christopher Hale
Archbishop Golka Distances Himself From the Trump Video, Falls Short of an Apology
Denver’s archbishop told his own paper he never meant the video as an endorsement of Trump. He blamed critics for the disunity and never mentioned Paula…
 • Christopher Hale

Pope Leo Takes on AI

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Palantir Executive Photoshops Pope Leo XIV in a Company Hoodie as Silicon Valley Splits Over Him
The stunt came eight days after Palantir’s co-founder called the pope a “useful idiot” for China. Not everyone in tech laughed, and some of the pope’s…
 • Christopher Hale
Pope Leo XIV’s New AI Encyclical Is Already Making a Dent in Trump’s Washington
Days after Magnifica Humanitas landed, JD Vance quoted it to Air Force cadets and Trump signed an AI order he had shelved. Pope Leo XIV is quickly…
 • Christopher Hale
Pope Leo XIV Just Quoted The Lord of the Rings Against Peter Thiel’s Empire — and Thiel Is Now Fleeing America
The man who calls his venture fund ‘the precious’ — Gollum's name for the One Ring — is in Buenos Aires, discussing the Antichrist over dinner.
 • Christopher Hale
‘The Grand Humbling’ — Silicon Valley Responds to Pope Leo XIV
Dean Ball, Doug Burgum, David Sacks, and Raymond Arroyo all came for Magnifica Humanitas this week. JD Vance praised it. The men who actually own AI…
 • Christopher Hale
“Disarm AI” — Pope Leo XIV Drops His First Encyclical on Slavery, Algorithms, and War
The pope’s first encyclical takes on autonomous weapons, the layoff cycle behind generative AI, and the algorithmic capture of democracy — and asks…
 • Christopher Hale
Pope Leo XIV’s First Encyclical Arrives Tomorrow — Here’s What We Expect
Pope Leo XIV says humanity faces a choice: the Tower of Babel or a civilization of love. Magnifica Humanitas, his first social encyclical, releases…
 • Christopher Hale
“An Eclipse of What It Means to Be Human” — Pope Leo XIV Previews AI Encyclical
At the Vatican on Friday, the American pope previewed Magnifica Humanitas — the encyclical Cardinal Michael Czerny tells CBS News will confront “control…
 • Christopher Hale
Confronting Silicon Valley, Pope Leo XIV Drops His AI Encyclical on Memorial Day With Anthropic Onstage
“Magnifica Humanitas,” the first papal encyclical on artificial intelligence, lands Monday in the Vatican’s Synod Hall — alongside an Anthropic…
 • Christopher Hale
If You Want to Understand Pope Leo’s New Encyclical, Read This First
Multiple Catholic outlets report Pope Leo XIV signed Magnifica Humanitas this morning, with public release set for later this month. The document it’s…
 • Christopher Hale
JD Vance’s Top Donor Brings His War on the Pope to Rome
The billionaire behind JD Vance’s political rise delivered invite-only Antichrist lectures blocks from the Vatican — and Catholic institutions rushed to…
 • Christopher Hale
Pope Leo XIV Tells Rome’s Priests: No AI Homilies, No TikTok Priesthood
As Block fires 4,000 workers and Anthropic battles the Pentagon, the pope delivered a message Silicon Valley should hear — stop outsourcing your soul to…
 • Christopher Hale
Tech Billionaire’s “Never Die” Religion Meets Pope Leo’s Rebuke
Bryan Johnson claims Jesus had a 2,000-year monopoly on conquering death. Now Silicon Valley’s immortality guru is boasting he can break it. But Pope…
 • Christopher Hale

Pope Leo's Life & Formation

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The Seamless Garment Pope: Two Overlooked Videos From Chiclayo and New Lenox Explain Leo XIV
Before the conclave, Cardinal Robert Prevost praised Bernardin and Cupich and said a pro-death-penalty Catholic can’t claim to be pro-life. The right’s…
 • Christopher Hale
Pope Leo XIV’s College Years Included a Laxative Prank — and the Vatican Put It on Film
An Augustinian friar recounts the practical jokes of the international college in “Leone a Roma,” and the editors cut to a photo of young Bob Prevost…
 • Christopher Hale
“John, I’m the Pope” — Viral Nikes, Car Talk, and the Disarming Humanity of Leo XIV
Fr. Jim Sichko just handed Leo XIV a pair of custom Nikes, and we learned about Pope Leo XIV’s tech repair work for his brother. The world is meeting…
 • Christopher Hale
“Families Fight. But Family Is Forever.” — Pope Leo XIV’s Brother on the Year MAGA Tried to Tear the Prevosts Apart
Across EWTN, La Croix, NBC Chicago, and CNN, John Prevost talked Trump, Pete Hegseth, the bank teller, AI deepfakes, the Peeps, Bozo’s Circus, and the…
 • Christopher Hale
“Would It Matter If I Told You I’m Pope Leo?” — The Bank Teller Who Hung Up on Robert Prevost
Father Tom McCarthy, who has known Pope Leo XIV for 43 years, told the story at a parish outside Chicago this past Sunday — alongside Peeps closets…
 • Christopher Hale
“I Confessed Everything Short of Murder” — Pope Leo’s MAGA Brother Bares All
Louis Prevost’s surprise tell-all on Piers Morgan Uncensored revealed a contrite, self-reflective older brother to Pope Leo XIV — a far cry from the…
Villanova Days: How College Shaped Pope Leo XIV
Before he was the pope railing against a “throwaway culture,” he was Bob Prevost, a quiet and nerdy math major at Villanova University with a passion…
 • Christopher Hale
The Pope’s Closest Aide Is a Millennial from Peru
The charismatic young priest’s close bond with Leo — from the villages of Peru to the halls of the Vatican — has already won him a following among the…
 • Christopher Hale

Letters from Leo — the American Pope & US Politics

Letters from Leo is a chronicle of how Pope Leo XIV’s papacy intersects with American politics, faith, and the digital age during the presidency of Donald Trump.
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