WASHINGTON — Pope Francis criticized Donald Trump on Thursday, saying the GOP front-runner is "not Christian" for his stance on immigration.
“A person who thinks only about building walls, wherever they may be, and not building bridges, is not Christian,” Francis told a reporter in Italian while on a plane back to the Vatican after a six-day trip to Mexico.
Pope Francis, on Donald Trump https://t.co/2QKmY78z7t pic.twitter.com/Ch22uK9aym— Mashable News (@MashableNews) February 18, 2016
Trump has made building a wall between the United States and Mexico a cornerstone of his presidential bid. He repeatedly says that Mexico will pay for the wall, as well.
Trump immediately fired back at the pope’s comments, calling Francis “disgraceful” for questioning his faith.
In which @realDonaldTrump calls the pope "disgraceful." pic.twitter.com/Q3cGxYCZ31— Emily Cahn (@CahnEmily) February 18, 2016
Speaking at a campaign event in South Carolina shortly after the pope's comments, Trump also blamed the Mexican government for poisoning Francis' thoughts on his character.
WATCH: Donald Trump responds to Pope's comments questioning his Christianity. https://t.co/pw8iOpkLjv - via @MSNBC https://t.co/Z0bEpYA3f0— NBC Nightly News (@NBCNightlyNews) February 18, 2016
Francis "said very negative things about me because the Mexican government convinced him that Trump is not a good guy," Trump said.
"He is questioning my faith, and i was surprised to see it," Trump says. Suggests the pope isn't being Christian to question his faith— Holly Bailey (@hollybdc) February 18, 2016
Trump also posted a full statement online, in which he said Francis would regret it if ISIS attacked the Vatican and Trump were not president.
(function(d, s, id) { var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0]; if (d.getElementById(id)) return; js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id; js.src = "//connect.facebook.net/en_US/sdk.js#xfbml=1&version=v2.3"; fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs);}(document, 'script', 'facebook-jssdk'));In response to the Pope:If and when the Vatican is attacked by ISIS, which as everyone knows is ISIS’s ultimate...Posted by Donald J. Trump on Thursday, February 18, 2016
The dueling statements come just days before the South Carolina Republican primary, where evangelical Christians will have an outsized impact on who wins. Trump currently leads by a wide margin in state polls.
Last week, Trump criticized the pope's plans to pray at the U.S.-Mexico border. Francis did just that on Wednesday, paying tribute to migrants who had died trying to cross the Rio Grande.
Asked if he felt he was being used as a pawn of Mexico, Francis said he didn't know. "I leave that judgment to you, the people," he said.
[img src="http://admin.mashable.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/PopePlaneTrump.jpg" caption="Building border walls is "not in the Gospel," Pope Francis told reporters aboard his flight from Mexico to Italy on Thursday." credit="ALESSANDRO DI MEO/AFP/Getty Images" alt="PopePlaneTrump"]
But he seemed quite pleased to hear that Trump had called him a "political" figure, noting that Aristotle had described the human being as a "political animal."
Trump himself had heaped praise on the pontiff Thursday morning in an interview with Breitbart’s Stephen K. Bannon on SiriusXM radio.
“I love the pope in many ways. I love what he stands for and I like his attitude. He’s very independent and he’s very different. He’s sort of a modern day pope if you think about it,” Trump said on the program.
But after the pope and The Donald began their verbal scuffle in the afternoon, a Trump adviser couldn't resist another jab at Francis:
Amazing comments from the Pope- considering Vatican City is 100% surrounded by massive walls. pic.twitter.com/g3iVLDVGe5— Dan Scavino (@DanScavino) February 18, 2016
Additional reporting by The Associated Press.