He Chose... Poorly.

I've been asked to pontificate about the Pope.

I currently have some fairly sniffy feelings towards the Pope. Not just for tying up traffic of late, but also for his crackerjack deadly sins for the new millennium. First of all, I don't appreciate sins that can't be summed up with one word and remembered mnemonically through the cast of Gilligan's Island. As for the actual sins themselves, more sniffage. Pah-shaw. Here's the list:

(1) Genetic modification;
(2) Human experimentations;
(3) Polluting the environment;
(4) Social injustice;
(5) Causing poverty;
(6) Financial gluttony; and
(7) Taking drugs

I can tell you, having seen firsthand his motorcade of towncars and massive SUVs rolling around DC with a ba-zillion cops, that the Pope doesn't seem all that worried about his carbon footprint. OK, what's really bothering me is that they used boring motorcades instead of the Popemobile, thus denying me the opportunity to drop the word Popemobile into everyday conversation. I love that word. Still, I don't think the Popemobile runs on biodiesel.

Popemobile Popemobile Popemobile.

And it's bad enough that he focused on drug abuse instead of child abuse¹ but "financial gluttony?" This is The Vatican we're talking about. Huge stockpiles of gold? Walls lined with priceless art? Centuries of crusades for land? It's their job to accumulate vast amounts of wealth, and I don't see them selling those Picassos for the poor peoples.

Before you make some comment about historical and cultural endowment blahdy-blah, let me remind you that the Pope's Prada shoes probably cost more than a month of my salary, and that I could probably only afford his outfit if I worked for a year straight and spent money on nothing but that one outfit. And I'm rich by global standards. Mother Theresa did ok without Dolce & Gabbana, but I suppose she was just a woman, so her work for the Lord isn't as quite as special as the boys. Still, didn't Jesus just throw on a burlap sack and some birkenstocks and call it an outfit? I don't remember the part in the Bible where He needed handmade Italian leather moccasins before curing the lepers, but who knows, maybe that's the trick to walking on water? Sigh, with Charlton Heston dead, I suppose we'll never know.

Oh, and what if, one day, this Pope is called upon to find the Holy Grail? Greedy McSinnerchasuble would TOTALLY pick the gold chalice, and then the Catholic Church would be screwed.

Even more disgraceful than the Pope is our charming president, who, after the Pope delivered an address at the White House on Wednesday, expressed his gratitude to the pontiff, "Thank you, Your Holiness. Awesome speech." To which I'm sure the Pope responded, "Dude, my pleasure. Jesus is totally righteous.2"

Benny the XVI and I might be able to find some common ground on soccer. I'm sure he's a big fan- I understand he was quite a supporter of Bundesliga in his native Germany. I imagine that now that he lives in the Vatican, he supports their team³. I could probably get behind the Vatican team- I hear they're great on crosses⁴.


1. If a 25-minute PR move counted as dealing with child abuse, Law and Order: SVU would be a much different show.
2. Get it?
3. Owning a soccer team would seem to be another indicator one may have accumulated excess wealth. And depending on the circumstances, also causing social injustice.
4. Get it?