According to both Vatican and U.S. officials briefed on the meeting, Pentagon brass picked apart the pontiff’s January speech, reading it as a hostile message directed at Trump’s policies.
One U.S. official went so far as to invoke the Avignon Papacy, the period in the 1300s when the French Crown leveraged its military power to dominate the papal authority.
In September 1303, French soldiers and their Italian allies invaded the papal residence and made off with the pope. One Italian nobleman famously slapped the pope across the face. They probably beat him half to death over the next three days, and he died shortly after his release.