WHY I WILL MAKE A GREAT POPE

POPE YORICK II

  * (This post contains no horse meat)

  ** (This post contains small amounts of recycled comedy, in keeping with our Keep Comedy Green policy)


I shouldn't really be talking about this yet, I mean nothing's confirmed ... you didn't even know I was papabile did you ( for the tiny minority of my readers who don't already know, this means shortlisted for the pope gig, one of the chosen few, a likely contender, and while we're on the subject it's not too late to get a few bucks down on me, I think you can still get 12 or even 15 to 1 odds, money for jam because it's pretty much a lock, just a couple of contractual details and your obdt svt will be installed as Pope Yorick II. I'm not saying money has changed hands, I'm just saying this is a bet you can't lose )  But wait, I hear you say, you're not even a catholic. And you're right, and my point is, so what ? You've had an all-catholic team in the Vatican up to now, and it hasn't always been a howling success, has it ? It's the 21st century, people, time for a change.

So what can you expect from Pope Yorick II ?  Well, in short, we are going to dump the junk and bring the funk. And yes I am a fifty-eight year old white man and I promise never to say anything like that ever again. But anyway. Look at the photo. How many other cardinals you know can drink coffee and ride a bicycle at the same ?  Of course there'll be changes. I've had a look around the Vatican and - no girls ! WTF. This is a bad idea, dudes, I said to them. This will end badly. So we'll be getting more girls. I mean making concerted efforts to restore an equitable gender balance. And as for the Vatican, look, you know, Italy's great and all that, but there's the traffic and the pollution, and I'm thinking of the Seychelles, or the Bahamas maybe. Bit more of a laidback vibe. I'm thinking a spiritual version of Club Med, you know Club Catholic, where all your venial sins are free and you swap your mortal sins for those little linking orange beads. Get a necklace and you take yourself off to one of our air-conditioned coconut palm confessionals.

And I'll be introducing our gold-glass midnight champagne mass. Communion champagne will be followed by communion Cabernet sauvignon followed by communion Chateau Y'quem. God moves in a mysterious way, and so will you .... so look I'm just vamping at the moment, throwing a few ideas down on the table to see if anyone runs them up a flagpole and salutes them. At the end of the day. One way or another, it's going to be a hell of a papacy.

The new Popemobile ?  Bugatti Veyron.