Strepsiades: First tell me, I
beseech thee, what thou art doing?
Socrates: Walking in the air and
speculating on the sun. -- Aristophanes, The Clouds
A work of fiction, by Fr. René Tiepolino (nom de plume)
The Pope inaugurated
the Era of Tenderness yesterday by knocking out a traditionalist priest in St.
Peter’s Square. Anna Maria Giraffa
reports: ‘We were passing the Papal balcony on a pilgrimage, when the window
was torn open and the Holy Father flung out a ‘fresh air’ canister in our
direction, felling don Massimo like a tree. My mother, quick-thinking as ever despite her
97 years, gave his Reverence a quick squirt with the contents, without any
visible effects. Nuns watching from a near-by convent dragged him inside and
laid him to rest in the front parlour. The
infirmarian Suor Tachipirina, after administering certain secret herbal
remedies, later reported his condition as ‘stable’.
*
Webnews: It seems that the
Era of Tenderness got off to a rather shaky start.
Mgr. Psittacus (President of the Vatican
Spin Committee): Not at all. The gesture was of a strictly ecological nature. The
Pontiff, while cleaning out a guest cloakroom in the Papal apartments for a
gaggle of Moslem terrorists, as a gesture of ‘humility and ambition’ as he
later confided to a “Fran’s Fans” journalist, chanced upon the offending
article in a corner. As the Holy Father indelibly declared in his recent
encyclical on fly-sprays and fly-swats: these
canisters damage the ozone. By disposing of the can with such violence, he
was teaching us all to do likewise.
Webnews: But apparently this was not their first
encounter. His Holiness had had occasion to telephone the parish priest after
he had been exiled into a mountainous parish outside Sassari. It was a ‘gesture
of Mercy’, to pardon him for preaching the Catholic Faith in all its rigour for
two years uninterruptedly. But it seems that the priest had continued unabashed
(but not unbashed). Some people may view this action as recriminatory.
Mgr. Psittacus: Out of the question. The current
Vatican position towards the Catholic priesthood (at least publically) is that
of inclusiveness and embracing diversity.
*
Webnews: Your Excellency,
can you tell us something about the Era of Tenderness?
Mgr. Psittacus: The Year of Mercy
was not enough for the Pope. He was impelled by uncontrollable inner drives to go
on to declare an Era of Tenderness.
Webnews: You have recently been nominated Professor of
Love at PIFFLE (the Pontifical Institute for the Fathoming of the Fathomable
Lunacies of the Ecumenical Council).
Mgr. Psittacus: True.
Webnews: What sense of love are we talking about here?
Mgr. Psittacus: It’s not the traditional
concept of love: the Cross, self-sacrifice, total gift.
Webnews: But the Cross is central to the Catholic
Faith.
Mgr. Psittacus: The man of to-day has no
access to it. You have to make Faith relevant. What he understands to-day is cuddling.
We are seeing a shift from self-giving to closeness and tenderness.
Webnews: How is the era going to unfold?
Mgr. Psittacus: There will be three gestures
in all. In the first, the Pope will appear on the balcony, cuddling a rabbit.
This is extremely powerful, mediatically speaking. We saw this when he adopted
the gesture to encourage rabbits to breed like rabbits several months ago.
Webnews: I remember.
Mgr.Psittacus: This time we will be
encouraging our human brethren to get tender.
They should stop being afraid of
tenderness. This is very important! (stresses
His Excellency petulantly, thumping the table the while with chubby fist).The
Pope has insisted on this in his recent aeroplane Magisterium: In Nubibus. We have already acquired an
initial 40,000 rabbits who will be sent to couples in central Rome for cuddling
purposes.
Webnews: What about those allergic to rabbits?
Mgr. Psittacus: Goldfish will be provided.
Webnews: What about those who want to stick to the
previous vision of love, like traditional seminarians?
Mgr. Psittacus: They will be tenderized by Old
Mother Hubbard, as she did to the Franciscans of the Old Observance.
Webnews: How?
Mgr. Psittacus: With a meat-tenderizer.
Webnews: How is the rabbit community responding to the
proposal?
Mgr. Psittacus: With enthusiasm. The rabbit
selected for the Papal cuddle, Honeybun Radishnibbler III, fainted at the news from
pure euphoria, subsequently receiving no less than140,000 solidarity thumps on
Thumpogram.
Webnews: And the second gesture?
Mgr. Psittacus: A Dance of the Religions on
Pentecost Sunday. St. Peter’s Square will host the most spectacular dance ever orchestrated.
The dancing Franciscans in their sober brown habits, the cardinals in their red,
dancing the flamenco with castanets, led by Cardinal Frankie ‘Coco’ Chanel, Satanist
Cardinals provided with mini tridents, to take home afterwards for toasting
tea-cakes or for jabbing partners who step out of line, the Brasilian bishops
in multicolour, orthodox and Protestant pastors in black, dancing dervishes in
white, Harry Krishna’s boys in orange, Jews in folk costumes, Buddhists in yellow:
all weaving in and out of each other, circling, and slaloming, to represent the
never-ending process of Dialogue. Meanwhile the massed Deep South Gospel choirs
will sing: ‘We are the World’ and ‘It’s the Real Thing. Coke’. (His Excellency’s
face glows red at the joy of it all - helped by a couple of glasses of don
Basilio’s house red). Once they have got into full swing, the Holy Father will
drive down the middle of the square on the Papal moped.
Webnews: The ecumenical one?
Mgr. Psittacus: Yes.
Webnews: Who will be in the side-car? Bishop Gaia of
Lund?
Mgr. Psittacus: The side-car can’t take her.
She’s broken 5 episcopal thrones already – it’s her indigestible muesli
business, she eats most of it herself. No, we’re currently talking about a top
Freemason like Jock McTwaddle, Grand Master of the Scottish rite of Tea-cakes
and Scones. Others favour Martin Luther himself, genetically re-mastered,
complete with that creepy black hat of his. So where were we? Oh yes, the Pope
will drive up to the centre of the square, while the fountains are turned full
blast to drench all participants with Coca-cola. Simultaneously the Moslem
terrorists will be invited to take pot-shots at the assembled company from the
Papal apartments (with a preferential option for Catholics), according to the
highest ideals of Religious Freedom, freedom of self-expression, and all that
is noblest in Conciliar teaching. Pentecostalists placed on strategic roof-tops
with outstretched arms will send the ‘Spirit’ down on any-one surviving the
gun-shots. Wind-machines positioned at four edges of the square will blow
sticky red love-hearts in all directions. The era of Tenderness will officially
begin when the first love-heart sticks to His Holiness. At this point the choir
and all participants will sing together ‘We believe in Love’, swaying from side
to side with arms in the air and faces gazing heavenwards.
Webnews: The third gesture?
Mgr. Psittacus: - follows the dance. The
Pope calls for silence and solemnly announces the abolition of the Catholic
Faith.
Webnews: This may come as somewhat of a surprise to our
readers, so I would ask Your Excellency
to ‘unpack’ it a bit.
Mgr. Psittacus: With the Council the Church
came to an awareness of herself. This was one of her intents. She realized that
she was offensive, divisive. This was not nice, not tender. For this reason she
started promoting Religious Freedom: she no longer provided the only way of
living. She continued with Ecumenism. The Pope, in the latest declaration of
his Aeroplane Magisterium, has called it a mortal sin for a Catholic to convert
another Christian. Clearly the same applies to all Religions. We have seen crucifixes
concealed in public, and how can you help it, when a chief Moslem inches away from
the Pope is praying Allah to destroy us all, like we saw last Pentecost. It was
offensive to the Mullah, or at least embarrassing, and that’s just not on, if
tenderness is your game.
Webnews: So the Cross is out and tenderness in.
Mgr. Psittacus: That’s the shift in love I
was talking about. Then there was the testimony of the Bishops’ Synods on the
Family. Remember how a Korean Bishop asked for the abolition of the Sacrament
of Marriage? The Wisdom of the East. So where was I? (His Excellency reaches
into a breast pocket and draws out an agenda.) Ah yes, the Pope starts the
Abolition Speech by apologizing to all Religions, peoples, and persons
(including atheists) for all genocides, massacres, crusades, witch-hunts, fundamentalism, doctrinal and moral rigidity and
general nastiness perpetrated by the Church over the centuries... five minutes
grovelling ... let’s see now... He will then renounce the Papacy and, in
imitation of St. Francis himself, will divest himself of the cassock and don a
white kimono-style towelling-robe. The president of the United nations, Miss
Bunny Moon, will pronounce him President of the World Religions and affix a
plastic name-tag to this effect onto the robe.
After a pause for waving to all and sundry,
he will be escorted back to Santa Marta’s for a hamburger and chips, swilled
down with a Nesquik strawberry milk-shake. He will continue to live on the
premises, already de-Catholicized by substituting crosses for crucifixes. A
large clothes’ rail will be installed in the corridor outside his room with the
outfits and wigs pertaining to his new office. The Vatican stylist cum make-up
artist will take up residence in a converted broom-cupboard off the corridor.
The next day St. Peter’s will be
transformed into the World Religion Centre. Each side-chapel will be dedicated
to a different Religion, where rites are performed and the public received by respective
priests or ministers. Drinks and snacks will be available at the two areas originally
designated by the Council as bars (‘Bar Jonah’ and ‘Bar Abbas’), confessionals
will be turned into Turkish baths, and a spa with sauna will be installed in
the baptistery with an all-day breakfast , courtesy of Unichem. Gift shops for
crystals, personal aura-polishing kits, cheap and nasty vegan specials and such
like will fill remaining spaces, manned by snappy, Chinese atheists, while pointless
and insipid string and electronic music will be echoing around the edifice all
day long, with a 20 minute repeat-loop. A madwoman will be enthroned on the
High Altar, crowned as the ‘Goddess of Unreason’, shrieking, howling, laughing
and weeping, and jabbering nonsense around the clock.
The ex-Pope will drop in every day in a
different religious costume: one day a Lutheran pastor with tabs, another a Jewish
rabbit, Rabbi that is, complete with beard and ringlets, one day in yellow,
another in bright orange, and so on. On Saturdays he will appear as an Agnostic,
the Man of To-day, Son of the Apes, in a classical biker’s outfit with greased
black wig and blue suede orthopaedic jack-boots, while riot police are brought
in to tighten security, to avoid female fans breaking through the cordons for
tenderness-related motives. On Sundays, however, in memory of the Old Religion
and old times, he will wear white: a white suit with bell-bottoms and white
trilby, with a rainbow dog-collar.
Sunny days he will spend in a hammock in
the Vatican gardens ‘suspended between Heaven and Earth’, sipping fruit punch through
a flexi-straw and welcoming all callers with a spiritual hug, unless they’re
Catholic of course, when they’ll get a good braining.
