(LifeSiteNews) — Bishop Joseph Strickland told Tucker Carlson in an interview published Monday that the deaths of civilians in Gaza constitute “a holocaust of our time.”
When asked by Carlson why he weighed in on the expulsion of Carrie Prejean Boller from President Trump’s Religious Liberty Commission, Strickland said that he felt called to speak out against what he saw as Boller’s unjust treatment, after being challenged to do so by her.
Bishop Joseph Strickland on Israel closing the holiest church in Christendom and the “holocaust of our time” in Gaza.
0:00 Israel’s Forced Closure of the Church of the Holy Sepulcher
7:30 Why Are Christians Being Targeted?
15:25 What Is a Justified War?
26:26 So-Called Christian… pic.twitter.com/xudNcDm8Af— Tucker Carlson (@TuckerCarlson) March 30, 2026
Boller was removed from the Religious Liberty Commission earlier this month for allegedly attempting to “hijack a hearing” for her “own personal and political agenda on any issue” after she engaged panelists in heated debate about Zionism, which she declared incompatible with Catholic teaching. Boller had also challenged panelists to condemn Israel’s conduct in its war against Hamas in Gaza.
Strickland affirmed to Carlson, “As you said, I think Carrie was removed because they didn’t like the truth she was speaking. The truth about Gaza, which is verboten by many. The innocents that have devastatingly died there is just horrible.”
READ: Bishop Strickland: Carrie Prejean Boller ‘has been treated unjustly’
“It truly is a holocaust of our time,” he added.
Strickland agreed with Carlson that the commission pushed back against the “agenda” of political Zionism and the idea that “Christians need to embrace” this ideology.
On the contrary, the Catholic Church “is very clear” that Zionism is not a Christian idea, he pointed out.
The bishop shared that he contacted Boller to “offer her some support and some consolation” after she was removed from the Religious Liberty Commission. During their conversation, Boller asked him to publicly share his support for her.
“And I told her I would pray about it and I would consider it. But even as I told her that I would pray about it, I knew in my heart that … I was convicted.”
“I knew that if I was going to be the man I wanted to be, if I was going to be the Christian that I want to be, I had to speak up and to not attack anyone, but … basically say Carrie was removed from that committee because she was speaking truth.”
Strickland took aim at Boller’s opponents for saying she was removed for her “tone,” arguing that this is a pretext for removing her because of the substance of her argument.
Sometimes it’s appropriate for people to get heated and animated when they are speaking out for the truth, he countered.
Earlier in the interview, Carlson asked Strickland his thoughts about Israel’s police-enforced closing of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, suggesting that this amounted to Christian persecution.
“We know that…there were no synagogues completely closed. And we know that the Church of the Holy Sepulchre was not closed during the last two world wars,” noted Carlson, adding that Catholic clergy were even banned from entering the church to livestream a Mass.
“And moreover, I wasn’t aware that the secular government of Israel owned the Church of the Holy Sepulchre or, by the way, the Dome of the Rock, or any other religious building owned by someone else in East Jerusalem. I mean, where does this authority come from that you can just close someone else’s church?” said Carlson.
Strickland called the church closures “basically totalitarian.” Carlson questioned why the authorities would target the people of a peace-promoting religion, who do not pose any threat of violence to the government.
“There’s nothing less threatening than four Christian clergymen standing in an empty church livestreaming the sacraments, but they went after those guys. So, what does that tell you?” said Carlson.
“What it tells me is that truth is threatening,” said Strickland. “This Jesus of Nazareth stood before Pilate, the leader of the Roman Empire, that was stationed there in Jerusalem. And Pilate says, ‘What is truth?’ And the the mob that was there, Pilate himself, everyone was threatened by this Jesus, who we know, we believe is Truth incarnate.”
“For those who are promoting all of these things, closure of holy sites and the attack of innocent people, they are definitely threatened by the truth. Not by some propaganda, but by the real truth,” the bishop continued.
