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The Catholic Church is not done with Donald Trump.

Just as the president appeared to dial back his attacks on Pope Leo XIV, the Bishop of Palm Beach — whose diocese includes Trump's Mar-a-Lago estate — issued a scathing public scolding of Trump's "disrespectful and violent attacks" on the pontiff.

According to The Daily Beast, Bishop Manuel de Jesús Rodríguez, installed in his post by Pope Leo in December, issued an unusually blunt statement on Sunday that frames Trump's conduct as a constitutional violation.

"The Diocese of Palm Beach stands firm with our Holy Father, Pope Leo XIV, and strongly rejects the disrespectful and violent attacks that Donald J. Trump has directed against the Holy Father," the bishop wrote.

The bishop went further, asserting that Trump's attacks on the Pope violate constitutional protections. "These attacks also constitute a grave violation of the religious freedom enshrined in the Constitution of the United States and, as such, harm the rights of the American Catholic faithful."

"Please pray for the safety of the Holy Father," the statement concluded — a warning that carries particular weight coming from a bishop overseeing the area where Trump maintains his primary residence.

The feud began with Trump's original attack on the Pope for criticizing his unprovoked Iran war. Vice President JD Vance then escalated things by admonishing the pontiff to stick to matters of "morality" — effectively telling the Pope to stay out of geopolitical affairs.

The bishop's intervention carries added symbolic weight given his personal history. Rodríguez previously served in the Catholic church diocese in Queens, New York — roughly seven miles from where Trump was raised — making this a rebuke from a spiritual leader with geographic ties to the president's own background.

Pope Leo XIV has made clear he has no interest in continuing his public feud with Donald Trump. During his 11-day African tour, the pontiff firmly rejected the notion that he's been debating the American president, insisting his peace message transcends partisan politics.

According to Politico, Leo addressed the spiraling controversy that has dominated headlines all week. "There's been a certain narrative that has not been accurate in all of its aspects, but because of the political situation created when, on the first day of the trip, the president of the United States made some comments about myself," Leo said.

"Much of what has been written since then has been more commentary on commentary, trying to interpret what has been said."

The Pope was defending his remarks at a peace meeting in Bamenda, Cameroon — a city at the epicenter of a separatist conflict ravaging the country's Anglophone region for nearly a decade. In those remarks, Leo had blasted the "handful of tyrants" who were ravaging Earth with war and exploitation, Politico is reporting.

Leo emphasized the remarks predated Trump's attacks. "My remarks were written two weeks ago, long before Trump's criticisms began," he explained, undercutting Trump's narrative that the Pope was specifically targeting him.

"And yet as it happens, it was looked at as if I was trying to debate again the president, which is not in my interest at all," Leo said, making clear he views the controversy as a distraction.

Looking forward, the Pope signaled his priorities lie elsewhere. "I primarily come to Africa as a pastor, as the head of the Catholic Church to be with, to celebrate with, to encourage and accompany all the Catholics throughout Africa."

Donald Trump's Iran negotiations are collapsing under the weight of incompetence with Middle East experts openly dismissing the negotiating team of Manhattan real estate developers Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff, saying they're completely out of their depth on one of the world's most complex geopolitical stages.

According to interviews with Time, diplomats are unanimous in their assessment: the team lacks the fundamental understanding necessary to navigate Middle East complexities.

"Iran and the U.S. under [Trump son-in-law] Kushner and Witkoff? Failure. They get an F in diplomacy," observed former U.S. State Department Middle East negotiator Aaron David Miller.

Their track record speaks for itself, Miller explained as he pointed to Kushner and Witkoff's failed Russia-Ukraine negotiations and their stalled efforts between Israel and Hamas as evidence of unrelenting incompetence. "While even the most experienced negotiators would face steep challenges in such conflicts, Kushner and Witkoff failed to convey to either side the sense of urgency that a desirable deal was within reach—an essential condition for pushing negotiations forward."

"You accept the notion that a successful negotiation, if you have urgency, is based on finding some balance of interest between the parties. If you want out of this, I think they're going to have to come up with something that allows the Iranians to say they won something," he elaborated.

Former U.S. Ambassador to Turkey David Satterfield outlined what actual competent negotiations require, telling Time, "Not only does the U.S. need to make clear what its goals were, and to know internally where it was prepared to concede, and where it was not prepared to concede, where the line would be held, the red lines, but to have a realistic sense of what the other side was bringing with it."

A grasp of nuclear diplomacy also brings a whole new level of complexity.

Former senior State Department official Robert Einhorn warned that "the negotiator at the table has to think about how the domestic audiences will affect the outcome. And I think the negotiator on a nuclear issue is more constrained by his or her government bureaucracy and by public opinion."

The deepest problem is systemic: Trump surrounds himself with yes-men incapable of honest counsel, which Miller identified as Trump's fatal flaw in personnel selection:

"There is a discussion in which the president's advisors talk truth to power and basically say to him…'You've got the ultimate control. But if you're going to do this, this is exactly what is likely to happen. And in my judgment…if you do this, you might fail.'"

But such candor requires advisers willing to risk consequences. "Trump had four secretaries of defense in his first term. He had six national security advisors [during his two terms]. They know what happens if they embarrass the president or they become a problem."