Pope Leo XIV condemns war profiteers amid Trump feud, Africa visit

Pope Leo XIV used a cathedral in northern Cameroon to turn his feud with Donald Trump into a broader denunciation of leaders who finance war while ignoring human suffering, saying the world was “ravaged by a handful of tyrants” and warning that some were manipulating “the very name of God” for their own gain.

Speaking at St. Joseph’s Cathedral in Bamenda on Thursday, April 16, 2026, the pope condemned governments that spend billions on war and pressed a message of peace at a moment when his public clash with Trump has spilled into open view. The remarks came on the fourth day of his 11-day pastoral visit to Africa, a trip that will take him to 11 cities across four countries and underscores how central the continent has become to the Catholic Church’s future.

The setting mattered. Africa is home to more than a fifth of the world’s Catholics, about 288 million people, giving the pope’s words a reach that extends far beyond church walls. In Bamenda, a city in a region already scarred by a deadly insurgency, his attack on the economics and morality of war landed with unusual force. The speech was among his strongest condemnations of global conflict since taking office.

The confrontation with Trump sharpened the political edge of the visit. Trump renewed his attacks on the pope on social media after Leo criticized the US-Israeli military operation in Iran. The pope had also voiced concern about Trump’s warning that “a whole civilisation will die” if Iran did not accept US demands to end the war and open the Strait of Hormuz. That exchange has pushed the Vatican into direct friction with a former president who has made national strength and military coercion central themes of his politics.

Leo’s message in Cameroon fit the Vatican’s traditional diplomatic posture, but with sharper language than usual. The Holy See routinely presents itself as a broker for peace rather than a side in war, yet the pope’s words went further, casting modern conflict as a moral failure driven by elites who profit from violence while ordinary people absorb the costs. In a year shaped by war, nationalist politics and religious rhetoric, that combination gives the remarks the potential to resonate beyond Catholic audiences.

For the Vatican, the Africa trip is also a strategic signal. By placing one of his most forceful anti-war speeches in Bamenda, Leo linked the Church’s future growth to regions where conflict, poverty and religious identity are tightly intertwined. It was a pointed reminder that the moral case against war is no longer being made only in Rome.