Watching the news this morning and a question occurred to me:
You think the Pope ever just says to himself, "Fuck it, I've had it with the singing and the blessings and the crowds and the state dinners and etcetera already. I'm putting on some jeans and a T-shirt and going to get me a pizza and a beer, yo."
No? Yeah, probably not.
Just another reason I wouldn't want to be pope - well, that and having to hang out with GWB for the day.
I'd lay odds he gets plenty of pizza and beer at home.
ReplyDeleteAnd weinerschnitzel.
Not to be sacrilegeous, (and no offense to any Catholic visitors), but listening to him speak this morning, he sounded like the bad guy in a hundred movies from the 50's.
Just sayin'.
None taken, Nathan.
ReplyDeleteJim: I dunno about the current pontiff, but I know the last one liked to kick it a bit. He was known to go skiing and such, and he certainly didn't do that all decked out in the robes and hats and shepherd's crook... though I always thought it would be pretty awesome to see him using the crook as a ski pole.
I always thought it would be pretty awesome to see him using the crook as a ski pole.
ReplyDeleteHa! Thanks, Dave, that made me laugh this morning.
Watching the hoopla at the White House this morning, and everywhere else that the Pontiff goes, it just seemed to me that it must get old after a while. I mean it's his duty and all, but jeez, the guy never gets a break - he's always on.
Just every once in a while, I bet he'd just like to put on a pair of jeans and go to Barnes and Nobles like a regular guy. Get a cheese burger. Have a beer. Watch the Predator director's cut on DVD. Something. Without everybody asking for a blessing or kissing his ass.
And the hymns, all the friggin' time Man. I'll bet he's got 60's rock on inside the Popemobile. Waving to the the crowd and secretly listening to a little Rolling Stones or something.
As long as the Pope wears the official Pope Hat™, he's still technically Pope and can wear whatever he wants. So, yeah, he does kick back in jeans and a T-shirt and eat pizza--but he keeps the Pope hat on. If he should ever remove the Pope Hat™, and a Cardinal should pick it up and put it on, the two men would have to duel to the death in order to establish who the real Pope was.
ReplyDeleteConfusion over the proper master of the Pope Hat™ has occurred twice before, in 1054 and 1378.
Prior to 1054, the Christian Church in Rome and Constantinople had a hat-sharing agreement (established at the Second Ecumenical Council in 381). In 1054, however, Pope Leo IX refused to surrender the Pope Hat™, initially claiming "I sent it last week, have you checked with UPS, maybe they lost it," and then implicitly acknowledging that he hadn't mailed it at all, saying "I don't see what the big deal is, it looks better on me anyway." The ultimate result, of course, was the Great Schism between the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox churces.
Beginning in 1378, a series of would-be Popes "borrowed" the Pope Hat™, resulting in a four-decade dispute over who was the real Pope and who were "antiPopes." The controversy was ended at the Council of Constance, when Benedict XIII decapitated Gregory XII in an abandoned warehouse, thereby absorbing the powers of all the Popes Gregory XII had previously killed, regaining his mortality, the ability to father children, and a limited form of telepathy that allowed him to design a protective shield that still serves to restore and maintain the Earth's atmosphere. Gregory XII, accordingly, abdicated in favor of Pope Martin V, giving him the Pope Hat™ and retiring to have lots of kids and work on the atmospheric shield.
Since then, Popes have been very cautious in how the Pope Hat™ is looked after. There was a brief flare-up in 1517, when a renegade pastor named Martin Luther claimed he'd found the Pope Hat™ just sitting on a park bench in Wittenberg, but it turned out that the hat Luther was claiming was the Pope Hat™ was in fact nothing more than a red-and-green party hat with tassels. Nonetheless, Luther was able to trigger the great schism now known as the Reformation after he nailed his famous "95 Theses (Reasons I'm Pretty Sure This Is The Real Pope Hat™ And You Haters Should Just Shut Up)" to a church door in Wittenberg and posted it on his MySpace page along with a home video he'd made.
Sorry if I went on-and-on, but I majored in History in college and can vouch for the accuracy of everything written above. If only people realized how fascinating history really is!
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteJim,
ReplyDeleteJust under the pictures in the middle column, you'll find the rules of etiquette. #4 is the one you need.
http://tinyurl.com/6p8oo9
Ooh--one error:
ReplyDeleteGregory XIII, accordingly, abdicated in favor of Pope Martin V, giving him the Pope Hat™ and retiring to have lots of kids and work on the atmospheric shield.
...should have read:
Benedict XIII, accordingly, abdicated in favor of Pope Martin V, giving him the Pope Hat™ and retiring to have lots of kids and work on the atmospheric shield.
Sorry! The rest of it is entirely correct, though.
Goddammit, Eric! You nearly killed me with that.
ReplyDeleteNathan, I was sure, sure, that you were trying to Rick Roll me with that link, but I followed anyway. Wow, I didn't know about #4, I wonder what the deal with that is? Probably doesn't want to get ketchup on his white robe. :)
Dude,
ReplyDeleteYou put ketchup on pizza?
Troglodyte!
And I've told you...I can't stand the Rickroll thing...although I did think the Mets thing was funny.
When I prank you I promise to use more imagination. When I get you, you will have been truly gotten.
Nathan, no. Oh hell no. Ketchup on pizza?
ReplyDeleteBut seriously, you know how it is, you have a burger and get a little ketchup on your finger and end up wiping in on you pants. I would think that the temptation to wipe your hands on that white smock would be overwhelming.
Rick rolling the Pope, now that would be a funny gag. Just saying.
Rick rolling the Pope, now that would be a funny gag. Just saying.
ReplyDeleteUnless of course he was in a bad mood and sent you directly to hell for it.
And Eric? That was AWESOME. Though you did forget the brief stint of pope hat inheritance.
My assumption would be the pope eating in public thing goes back to all the assassinations etc.
Unless of course he was in a bad mood and sent you directly to hell for it.
ReplyDeleteWell, if there is a hell, I'm probably headed that way anyhoo, so anybody got the Pope's blog address?
On the subject of Popes and Hell, one is reminded of the classic Eddie Murphy bit re: the previous Pope's would-be assassin in the early '80s:
ReplyDeleteWhat’s your rationale for shooting the Pope? I guess the guy figured, "Hey look, I want to go to Hell and I don’t wanna wait on line with everybody else. I wanna take the Hell express." You walk up to the door with your ticket, they say, "Shot the Pope? You can go right through, man."
"I'm putting on some jeans and a T-shirt and going to get me a pizza and a beer, yo."
ReplyDeleteMaybe, but he'd say, "Ich setze mich auf einige Jeans und ein T-Shirt und werde eine Pizza und ein Bier erhalten." Yo.
I met the old Pope. I actually have what my ex-husband (lapsed Catholic, him) refers to as my "Get Out of Hell Free" card, otherwise known as a 'Papal Promise of Heavenly Favors'. Got it framed and everything. Of course, not being Catholic, when His Holiness gave me his ring to kiss, I shook his hand and said, "I'm pleased to meet you!"
I may be going to Hell anyway, card or no...
But at least I'll meet my mother there - she told our Vatican guide that the Pope reminded her of Yoda...