{"id":892558,"date":"2026-04-14T03:26:32","date_gmt":"2026-04-14T03:26:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/892558\/"},"modified":"2026-04-14T03:26:32","modified_gmt":"2026-04-14T03:26:32","slug":"northern-ireland-priest-slates-donald-trump-over-ai-jesus-image-saying-wannabe-king-mocks-christ-the-irish-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/892558\/","title":{"rendered":"Northern Ireland priest slates Donald Trump over AI Jesus image saying \u2018wannabe King mocks Christ\u2019 \u2013 The Irish News"},"content":{"rendered":"

Local religious and political leaders were among those reacting with shock and anger after President Donald Trump posted an image of himself as a Jesus Christ-like figure.<\/p>\n

The AI-generated image was posted on the president\u2019s Truth Social page on Monday morning but later deleted.<\/p>\n

It was posted just hours after Trump<\/a> launched an online attack on Pope Leo, claiming he was \u201cweak on crime\u201d and terrible \u201cfor foreign policy\u201d.<\/p>\n

Pope Leo replied that he had no fear of the Trump administration.<\/p>\n

\"Mo<\/a>\"Map<\/a>\"TheThe pope said he did not want to \u2018get into a debate\u2019 with the US president (Alberto Pizzoli\/Pool Photo via AP) (Alberto Pizzoli\/AP) <\/p>\n

Trump faced criticism from political and religious leaders in the US and beyond, including locally, for posting the Christ-like image. <\/p>\n

Fr Gary Donegan, a Passionist priest attached to the Holy Cross parish in Ardoyne<\/a>, said the post was \u201cverging on blasphemy\u201d as the \u201cwannabe King mocks Christ\u201d. <\/p>\n

Anyone in the United States \u201cthat represents Jesus should call him out over this\u201d.<\/p>\n

The image appeared to show Trump healing a sick man in a hospital bed with images of the Statue of Liberty, a large US flag, fighter jets and an eagle in the background.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve had the privilege of being in the last 35yrs at the bedside of 100s of sick and dying including seven literally dying in my arms,\u201d Fr Donegan said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is the most privileged of moments. As I anointed the sick, it\u2019s a profoundly sacred and holy experience.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"FrFr Gary Donegan pictured at the the Passionist Monastery at Tobar Mhuire in Crossgar, Co Down. PICTURE: MAL MCCANN <\/p>\n

The US President \u201cis a role that bears great responsibility, accountability, dignity and statesman-like behaviour\u201d, said Fr Donegan, adding he has met four who have held that position.<\/p>\n

\u201cSadly attacking the Holy Father and depicting himself as Our Lord blessing the sick is indeed sick in itself.\u201d<\/p>\n

He added: \u201cI met with 40 wonderful Irish Americans on Saturday people of great faith and had the privilege of offering Holy Mass for them.<\/p>\n

\u201cToday I think of them and the good people of America and can but pray for them.\u201d <\/p>\n

SDLP MLA Mark H Durkan posted the image with the message: \u201cI had to check if this absolutely chaotic post from Trump was real\u2026turns out it is! I doubt Pope Leo will lose much sleep over the spiralling innate ramblings of a man who is now completely detached from reality and sees himself as some sort of Messiah! Sheer madness!!”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Local religious and political leaders were among those reacting with shock and anger after President Donald Trump posted…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":892559,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5011],"tags":[251961,32,103395,21125,1144,41442,16,15,727],"class_list":["post-892558","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-northern-ireland","tag-ardoyne","tag-donald-trump","tag-images","tag-jesus","tag-northern-ireland","tag-pope-leo-xiv","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-us-news"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/116400933573581856","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/892558","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=892558"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/892558\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/892559"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=892558"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=892558"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=892558"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}