Billionaire venture capitalist and MAGA donor Peter Thiel is in Rome this week for a series of private lectures on the Antichrist. This is an event that the Vatican and the Pope are treating with caution.
Thiel’s meeting will be closed to the media and will take place at a private location. The invitation, obtained by The Associated Press, says the PayPal and Palantir Technologies co-founder will focus on the Antichrist, a figure in Christian teachings who opposes Jesus Christ before his second coming.
But Thiel’s appearance on the Vatican’s doorstep raised eyebrows, given the tension between his ideas and those of Pope Leo XIV. Two institutions of the Catholic Church are distancing themselves from the lecture series, which continues until Wednesday.
Mr. Thiel has previously written and spoken on the subject, arguing that the Antichrist does not necessarily have to be human, but could emerge as a global governing system. He argued that it would use people’s fears of artificial intelligence, climate change and nuclear war to seize control.
He also reportedly expressed concerns in past speeches that Vice President J.D. Vance, a Catholic convert whom he supported early in his career, was “too close to the Pope.” These comments reflect anxieties shared by some in the Trump administration about the Holy See’s global influence and independent moral authority. Thiel favors a more nationalist, technology-oriented vision, but the pope and the Holy See have repeatedly called for strengthening global institutions such as the United Nations.
So far, two Catholic institutions have distanced themselves from Thiel’s Rome lectures. The Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas, also known as Angelicum, denied initial reports that it would host the lecture. Angelicum is where the Rev. Robert Prevost, the future Pope Leo, conducted his doctoral dissertation research in the 1980s.
Thiel’s lecture is jointly sponsored by the Vincenzo Gioberti Cultural Institute, which aims to renew Italy’s political culture and “revive Catholicism as the basis of national identity,” and the Cluny Institute, based at the Catholic University of America in Washington.
“The Catholic University of America will not be sponsoring or hosting any events featuring Peter Thiel in Rome this month,” a university spokesperson told CNN. “The Cluny project is an independent initiative carried out at the university.”
Italian analyst and commentator Francesco Sisi said the Vatican and Pope were likely to “distance” from Thiel’s lecture, but added that the venture capitalist’s decision to visit Rome confirmed the growing interest in the Holy See and the Vatican among some politicians. Rome was important to former President Trump adviser Steve Bannon. Bannon is a strong opponent of Pope Francis and even courted Jeffrey Epstein in an effort to “bring down” the Pope.
Mr. Sisi sees Mr. Thiel, unlike Mr. Bannon, as someone who is trying to present his ideas at Catholic Church headquarters.
“The arrival of a new high-tech billionaire godfather in Rome is proof that the pope is important and that Catholicism is in some ways coming back into fashion. The pope is no longer a distant figure, he’s more involved in American politics,” Sisi, director of the Appian Institute, told CNN. “As the pope of the United States, he will distance himself from[Thiel]. The Vatican will be careful not to be manipulated.”
Though more modest than his predecessors, the first American-born pope has become something of a spiritual counterweight to Trump’s worldview. He has expressed concern about the treatment of immigrants in the United States, called for an immediate ceasefire in the Middle East, and told reporters on Monday that he should not become a “megaphone for power” during wars. Leo made the latter comment after President Donald Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth strongly criticized media coverage of the Iran war.
Thiel, on the other hand, not only provided Vance with financial support, but also introduced him to the ideas of Catholic philosopher René Girard, which influenced Vance’s conversion to Catholicism. Vance has also cited St. Augustine, founder of Pope Leo’s order of Augustinians, when defending the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown. However, Leo criticized the “inhumane treatment” of immigrants in the United States.
