Vice President JD Vance told Fox News on April 13 that "in some cases it would be best for the Vatican to stick to matters of morality" and leave American public policy to the president. Three Catholic theologians say he has it exactly backward, that war, by its nature, is a matter of morality, and the Church has spent two millennia saying so.

The exchange, reported by EWTN News, lands at a tense moment. The U.S. and Iran entered a temporary two-week ceasefire on April 8, but no long-term peace deal has materialized. Pope Leo XIV has called publicly for peace. Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Pietro Parolin and Washington, D.C., Cardinal Robert McElroy have both said they do not believe the war fits just war criteria. And Vance, himself a Catholic, has found himself caught between his faith's teaching authority and his role defending the administration's foreign policy.

It is not a comfortable position. But the theologians who spoke to EWTN News argue that discomfort is the point, and that a Catholic vice president, of all people, should know better than to draw a bright line between morality and governance.

What Vance said, and what the pope posted

On his April 13 appearance on "Special Report with Bret Baier," Vance acknowledged that Pope Leo XIV serves as "an advocate for peace" and called that "certainly one of his roles." But he drew a line:

"In some cases it would be best for the Vatican to stick to matters of morality, to stick to matters of what's going on in the Catholic Church, and let the president of the United States stick to dictating American public policy."

The next day, at a Turning Point, USA event at the University of Georgia, Vance went further. He challenged Leo's understanding of just war doctrine and responded directly to a post the pope had made on X. Leo had written:

"God does not bless any conflict. Anyone who is a disciple of Christ, the Prince of Peace, is never on the side of those who once wielded the sword and today drop bombs."

Vance fired back with a question: "Was God on the side of the Americans who liberated France from the Nazis?" And: "Was God on the side of the Americans who liberated Holocaust camps and liberated those innocent people...?" His answer: "I certainly think the answer is yes." He also said the pope should be "careful when he talks about matters of theology."

EWTN News reached out to Vance's office to ask whether entering or conducting war involves matters of morality. It did not receive a response by publication time.

Theologians: no such thing as an 'amoral arena'

The three scholars who did respond, Joseph Capizzi of The Catholic University of America, Taylor Patrick O'Neill of Thomas Aquinas College, and Ron Bolster of Franciscan University in Steubenville, Ohio, disagreed with Vance's framing in different ways but reached the same conclusion: separating morality from public policy is not a Catholic option.

Capizzi, the dean and ordinary professor of moral theology and ethics at Catholic University, was blunt. Vance, he said, is "just wrong." The Church has existed for more than 2,000 years, and its accumulated wisdom on questions of war and peace is not a side hobby. It is central to its mission.

"For people to be moral, they need a good, healthy, stable political community. All of us, men, women, children, priest and religious, lay, and so on have a stake in the moral good of the political communities we inhabit."

Capizzi added that the Church's "experience, her wisdom, her tradition are critical resources for helping us live in good communities." He called the plea that Church leaders should "stick to morals and avoid politics" an old argument, and one "rightly rejected by all Catholics, lay or otherwise."

That last point carries weight. The same logic Vance used to push back on the Vatican's commentary about war could just as easily be used to silence the Church on abortion, immigration, or poverty. Capizzi made this explicit:

"It's what many relied on in the past to try to quiet Catholics about immigration, abortion, poverty, and many other issues. The overlap of politics and morality is expansive."

This is worth sitting with. For decades, conservative Catholics have rightly insisted that the Church has every reason, and every right, to speak on the moral dimensions of abortion policy, religious liberty, and the family. Vance himself has navigated this terrain before, acknowledging that he went "too hard" on Catholic bishops over immigration resettlement funding. The principle that faith informs policy cannot be a one-way switch, turned on for issues where the Church agrees with your administration and off when it doesn't.

Just war doctrine and the World War II question

O'Neill, the Thomas Aquinas College theologian, called Vance's original comment "very uncareful." He laid out the Catholic position plainly:

"There is no amoral arena. There's no aspect to our... life where moral aspects don't come into play."

The pope's role in teaching on faith and morals, O'Neill said, "includes politics." He added: "It would be quite odd... and not in step with the tradition of the papacy" for a pope to avoid speaking on "the faith and the morals of believing people worldwide."

O'Neill also drew a distinction that Vance may have blurred. The pope is not trying to "dictate public policy" in the sense of "directing the [government] in regard to what sort of military formations to use." Rather, the Church teaches that "certain policies are intrinsically contrary to human flourishing and dignity", and those are "moral truths that should affect policy."

On Vance's World War II challenge, O'Neill offered a reading rooted in Scripture. He said Leo appeared to be referencing Christ's words, "all who take the sword will perish by the sword", and explained that the pope was not necessarily condemning every act of armed defense. The broader point, O'Neill said, is about posture and spirit.

"Even when a Christian has to take up the sword, he doesn't live by the sword. He does so as if it's a tragedy."

Those who treat warfare casually, as "a joke" or something that's "cool", are "not living in accordance with the spirit of Christ," O'Neill said. "The spirit should always be turned away from warfare."

The distinction matters. Just war doctrine, which St. Augustine wrote about extensively in the early fifth century, does not prohibit all war. It sets conditions. And the theologians' point is that evaluating whether those conditions are met is itself a moral exercise, one the Church has every standing to engage in.

Bolster: Vance is in a tough spot, but the Gospel still applies

Ron Bolster, the dean of theology and philosophy at Franciscan University, offered the most sympathetic reading of Vance's position, while still disagreeing with it. He said he wished the vice president "hadn't taken his disagreement with the Holy Father publicly." But he acknowledged the bind Vance faces.

The broader tensions inside the administration's coalition on Iran policy are real. Bolster noted that when someone in Vance's position "questions whether [the soldiers are] involved in something that's morally legitimate, you jeopardize their ability to do their job and you jeopardize their safety." That is a genuine concern for any wartime leader.

Still, Bolster did not let the difficulty of the position excuse the argument. He said the Gospel should "bear on public policy" and that the pope has a responsibility to "try to bring public servants to a better appreciation for how the Gospel would be advanced in their policies", and to call them out "when they're out of line in that regard."

"The Gospel and morality [should] drive all policy and any action that we would take."

Bolster also offered context for Leo's X post that Vance had challenged. He read the pope's comment not as a blanket pacifist statement but as a response to specific threats made against Iranian civilians and culture. "The threats were made against the culture, the civilians, and the innocents," Bolster said. The pope, he argued, "has a responsibility to all of the souls entrusted to him and to protect the innocents and call out an escalation that would go beyond the military targets."

A pattern of friction, and a relationship still forming

The Vance-Vatican dynamic is still new, and it is already complicated. The New York Post reported that Vance met Pope Leo XIV at the Vatican and delivered a personal letter from President Trump and the first lady inviting the pope to visit the United States. In Vatican video, Leo took the letter, placed it on his desk, and replied simply, "at some point", without committing to a date. The Vatican issued a statement noting "an exchange of views on some current international issues, calling for respect for humanitarian law and international law in areas of conflict."

That lukewarm reception fits a pattern. Pope Leo, the Chicago-born pontiff, has signaled continuity with Pope Francis on issues of migration and peace, areas where the current administration has faced sharp Vatican criticism. Vance himself has been at the center of earlier clashes with Church leadership over deportation policy.

The vice president's broader foreign-policy portfolio has also hit headwinds. His recent departure from Pakistan without an Iran nuclear deal underscored the difficulty of the administration's negotiating position, even as the temporary ceasefire holds.

Some of the backlash Vance has faced from Catholic quarters has veered into symbolism over substance. National Review noted that Vance drew online criticism for not kissing the pope's ring during their Vatican meeting, but pointed out that John F. Kennedy and Joe Biden followed the same protocol. Vance said he attended the pope's inaugural Mass not "as a Catholic parishioner" but as vice president representing the president's delegation, consistent with longstanding American diplomatic tradition.

That kind of criticism is easy to dismiss. The theological objections raised by Capizzi, O'Neill, and Bolster are not.

The real question Vance left unanswered

EWTN News asked Vance's office a simple question: does entering or conducting war involve matters of morality? The office did not respond. The silence is telling, because the answer, for any Catholic, should be obvious.

Capizzi noted that leaders who wage just wars do not do so with swagger. They "pray in the hope that they are doing God's will... with humility and even a fear of God that they have rightly judged [the] situation." They avoid "praying with hubris or arrogance about their judgment, because they know God's judgment alone matters."

He also said Leo's broader concern appears to be "about the rise in recourse to violence to attempt to solve problems", and that those who "wage wars" in the pope's framing "are those turning to violence rather than looking for other solutions."

Vance is right that the president sets American foreign policy. No serious person disputes that. But the claim that the Vatican should confine itself to "matters of morality" while staying silent on war is, as these theologians point out, a contradiction in terms. War is a matter of morality. It always has been. Washington's political divisions do not change that.

A Catholic vice president asking the Catholic Church to stop talking about the morality of war is not a winning argument. It is a concession that the argument on the merits is one he would rather not have.