New from me at Christianity Today (unlocked link):

Plenty could be said of the details of Trump’s comments about the pope. But more important, I think, is the posture this pair of posts evinces toward the things of God. Even if Trump is right on every issue he invokes—crime, COVID-19 closures, Iran, Venezuela, and the stock market—he’s still grotesquely wrong to elevate himself to the level of Christ and claim for himself authority over Christ’s church.

The elevation in that image is not debatable. It’s not generic self-aggrandizement. It’s not a classic political cartoon. It’s not, as Trump implausibly claimed, “me as a doctor, making people better.”

Nor is it just one more Trumpian exaggeration, as longtime commentator Geraldo Rivera suggested, and therefore something we shouldn’t take seriously. Nor yet is it something we should take “seriously, but not literally,” as is so often true of Trump. It’s sacrilege, plain and simple. It’s blasphemy.

I don’t say that because I’m “offended,” in Rivera’s term. My feelings aren’t really relevant here. I say it because I have functioning eyes, and I can see what this image is intended to convey.