Pentagon tells Pope Leo that the US can ‘do whatever it wants’: report

(LifeSiteNews) — Pope Leo XIV and the United States administration are at odds following a January Pentagon meeting and escalating papal criticism of conflicts in the Middle East, according to a report.

On April 6, The Free Press published a report according to which, in January 2026, there was a private meeting between Cardinal Christophe Pierre, then Apostolic Nuncio of the Holy See to the United States, and Albright Colby, the U.S. Deputy Secretary of War. The meeting was reportedly very tense and rough, during which Colby urged Pope Leo to “align himself more clearly with the United States” and remarked that the U.S. can “do whatever it wants.”

“The United States has the military power to do whatever it wants in the world. The Catholic Church had better take its side,” Colby said during the meeting, according to officials cited by The Free Press.

According to multiple sources cited anonymously in the report, the January meeting marked a turning point in U.S.-Vatican relations. Roman officials characterized the encounter as confrontational, describing it as a “bitter lecture” delivered to the cardinal at the Pentagon. The same sources indicated that the remarks were perceived within the Vatican as an “explicit warning” tied to American military power.