During his flight back to Italy after a six-day trip to Mexico that culminated in a visit to the Mexico-Texas border in Juarez, Pope Francis said Donald Trump "is not a Christian."

The Pope was asked about the Republican presidential hopeful during a mid-air press conference on his flight back to Rome, and said, "A person who thinks only about building walls, wherever they may be, and not building bridges, is not Christian," according to The NY Times.

The Pope's comments on Trump came hours after leading a mass in front of more than 200,000 in Juarez that was simulcast at the Sun Bowl in El Paso. Before the mass, he visited the border, and laid flowers at a memorial for those who have died trying to cross. Speaking of the violence to both plague Juarez and the border, Francis said migrants “are the brothers and sisters of those expelled by poverty and violence, by drug trafficking and criminal organizations.”

When Francis was asked if he would influence Catholics in how they vote in the U.S. presidential election, he said that he "was not going to get involved in that," and of Trump said, "I say only that this man is not Christian if he has said things like that," of his comments regarding a wall at the Mexican border and increase the number of deportations, The NY Times reported.

Trump, at a South Carolina campaign stop, responded by saying when the Vatican is attacked, "the pope would only wish and have prayed that Donald Trump would have been elected president.”

In a Facebook status, Trump said, "For a religious leader to question a person’s faith is disgraceful."

 

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