Pope Leo XIV has been trading blows with the White House over the war in Iran. Leo insists the war is unjust. In response, President Trump has called him “weak.”
It feels like a historic moment. But this kind of standoff is hardly new, and is older than you might think.
In fact, popes and political leaders have been clashing for over a thousand years. Sometimes the pope won. Sometimes the political leader did. Each instance provides an interesting lesson about religious vs. political authority.
Here are five times a pope drew a line – and refused to move it.
1. Pope Gregory VII vs. Holy Roman Emperor Henry IV (1076)
This one sets the bar for dramatic papal confrontations, and you could argue it has never really been cleared.
When Holy Roman Emperor Henry IV tried to appoint his own bishops against the pope's wishes, Gregory VII promptly excommunicated him. That meant Henry's subjects across Germany and Italy were released from their oaths of loyalty to him – effectively dissolving his political authority overnight.
Henry had one year to get the ban lifted or lose his throne permanently. So he did something no one expected: he crossed the Alps in the middle of winter, walked barefoot through the snow to the castle at Canossa in northern Italy, and stood outside the gates for three days until Gregory agreed to see him. The most powerful ruler in Europe was on his knees, in a blizzard, waiting for the pope to open the door (or so a dramatic reading of the story goes).
Gregory lifted the excommunication. Henry went home and immediately went back to fighting with Rome. But the image stuck, and became a defining example of what spiritual authority could do to earthly power.
2. Pope Pius VII vs. Napoleon Bonaparte (1809)
Napoleon conquered most of Europe, but he was less successful with the pope.
When the French emperor annexed the Papal States and demanded that Pius VII submit to French authority, the pope responded by excommunicating him. Napoleon's answer was to have Pius arrested and hauled into captivity in France, where he remained for nearly five years.
Napoleon pressured Pius into signing a new concordat. Pius signed it – then withdrew his signature. The pope, imprisoned by the most powerful military figure of the age, still refused to fully capitulate.
Napoleon finally stumbled and lost power 1814. Pius returned to Rome and was cheered for refusing to submit. One takeaway? Moral authority can outlast military might.
3. Pope John Paul II vs. the Soviet Bloc (1979)
When Pope John Paul II – the first Polish pope in history – returned to his homeland in June 1979, the Soviet-backed government was deeply nervous. They couldn't stop the visit. They couldn't control what happened next, either.
Millions of Poles poured into the streets to greet him. John Paul II's message was deceptively simple: "Do not be afraid." For people living under strict communist rule, it was one of the most charged phrases anyone had ever spoken publicly. He gave an entire country permission to hope – and its leaders reason to worry.
His papacy went on to become one of the most significant moral forces behind the Solidarity movement and, eventually, the collapse of communist Eastern Europe. John Paul II didn't topple anything with force, but his words fortified the push for freedom that would come.
4. Pope Paul VI vs. President Lyndon Johnson on Vietnam (1965)
This one is a fairly close parallel to what's playing out today – an American president, a war, and a pope speaking for peace.
In 1965, Paul VI became the first pope to address the United Nations, where he delivered one of the most quoted lines in the history of the papacy: "No more war, war never again!" Two years later, he pressed President Johnson directly to pursue peace negotiations in Vietnam. Johnson acknowledged the pope's concerns publicly and called the meeting warm.
The war, however, continued for another decade.
On the surface, Paul VI's intervention failed. But it also established an important precedent: that a pope had both the standing and the obligation to speak directly to an American president about the morality of war.
5. Pope Francis vs. Donald Trump on Immigration (2016)
Some of you will remember this one.
When Pope Francis visited the U.S.-Mexico border in 2016, a reporter asked him about then-candidate Trump's proposal to build a wall. Francis didn't dodge the question. "A person who thinks only about building walls – wherever they may be – and not building bridges, is not Christian," he said.
Trump called the comments "disgraceful." He then described Francis as "a wonderful guy."
The exchange was relatively brief, and the two later smoothed things over. But a pope calling a presidential candidate's signature policy un-Christian was a window into future conflict.
Nearly a decade later, a new pope and the same president are at it again, over a war this time, and with considerably less smoothing over.
An Age Old Tradition
The pattern here is not hard to recognize: a pope speaks out, a political leader pushes back, and conflict erupts. The real “winner” is not always immediately clear.
The pope may not have an arsenal of conventional weapons at his disposal, but if history is any judge, the spiritual and moral authority wielded by the head of the Catholic Church lends a different type of power that should not be easily discounted.
What do you think? Should religious leaders draw lines in the political sand, or is getting involved in geopolitics beyond the scope of the job?
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