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“Notre Dame Cathedral came down in flames the year (2019) before Donald Trump's political fortunes went up in smoke when he lost re-election (in 2020). Now both are risen from the ashes,” a reporter for Sky News explained on December 7, 2024, of President Donald J. Trump’s return to the world stage.
Alongside French President Emmanuel Marcon, President-elect Trump attended Notre Dame Cathedral’s rebuilding dedication with 50 world leaders and dignitaries. Their smiles and handshakes made Trump the center of attention on the cathedral’s checkerboard floor. Knowing that he had just experienced the greatest political comeback in American history, the world’s princes, presidents and prime ministers wanted to make contact with the man on deck to lead the USA in January 2025.
Just as Notre Dame’s gothic architecture is intended to encourage visitors to look upward to the heavens, so President Trump has pointed people upward to God as he has reflected on the failed July 2024 assassination attempt on his life.
“Many people have told me that God spared my life for a reason,” Trump proclaimed during his election night victory speech in November 2024. “And that reason was to save our country and to restore America to greatness, and now we are going to fulfill that mission together. We’re going to fulfill that.”
Trump’s rebirth as a leader and Americans’ desire for a rebirth of prosperity, morality and patriotism can take a cue from the legend of the phoenix, an eagle-like bird that Pope Clement used in the first century A.D. to point people to God and the resurrection of Christ.
“Let us consider that wonderful sign [of the resurrection] which takes place in eastern lands, that is, in Arabia and the countries round about. There is a certain bird which is called a phoenix. This is the only one of its kind, and lives five hundred years. And when the time of its dissolution draws near that it must die, it builds itself a nest of frankincense, and myrrh, and other spices, into which, when the time is fulfilled, it enters and dies,” Clement wrote, noting that the bird rose from the ashes to soar toward the sun.
“Do we then deem it any great and wonderful thing for the Maker of all things to raise up again those that have piously served Him in the assurance of a good faith. when even by a bird He shows us the mightiness of His power to fulfil His promise?” Clement asked.
“For [the Scripture] says in a certain place, You shall raise me up, and I shall confess unto You; and again, I laid me down, and slept; I awoke, because You are with me; and again, Job says, You shall raise up this flesh of mine, which has suffered all these things (Job 19:25-26).”
Clement concluded by pointing his readers upward in the context of wise governance. “Having then this hope, let our souls be bound to Him who is faithful in His promises, and just in His judgments.”
Perhaps it’s fitting then that Trump’s return to the world stage took place at Notre Dame cathedral, where every feature, even the cathedral’s birds, lifts visitors’ eyes heavenwards.
President Trump is an American Phoenix. After he left office in 2020, many pundits and news casters wrote his political obituary. But over four years, he came back by surviving two assassination attempts, fending off court battles weaponized by his opposition and emerging as the candidate best suited to renew the economy, close the border and bring peace on earth by ending wars. He’s had one of the greatest—if not the greatest—comeback in American political history.
My favorite historical quotes are featured in my new 2025 American Phoenix calendar.
