Ok, here’s a not so hypothetical situation; pretend that you’re feeling a little bit crazy (possibly due to mental illness), and during Mass at the Vatican you push the Pope down. The Pope then has a meeting with you, tells you all is forgiven, and then proceeds to take you to court. Does that sound like forgiveness to you?

Well, that’s exactly what happened to Susanna Maiolo, who suffers from a mental illness (hey, she’s a Catholic, so that’s already a pretty good start down nutjob lane), and although this was explained to Senator Palpatine Pope Benedict XVI (who supposedly forgave her), it hasn’t stopped his legal department from continuing their case against her.

Perhaps Golem Ratzinger is a little confused as to what forgiveness actually means. Maybe he was just telling her that her soul is forgiven for such a heinous crime (he was totally uninjured, by the way), but that her physical body will still be brought to trial. Don’t you love Christian forgiveness? It’s so beautiful I think I’m going to cry

Pope Benedict XVI is on a mission; he’s decided to tour Europe to fight what he’s dubbed “atheist ideology” and “hedonistic consumerism” (this from the same man who quite literally eats off gold plate in a gigantic palace). His first stop is the European capital of unbelief: the Czech Republic. According to the latest polls, only about 19% of the population claims to believe in God, and those figures keep dropping every year. You’d figure the least religious place in Europe would be a stupid first place to visit, and you’d be right; Benny’s own advisors are telling him this is a stupid move, but hey, what’s the fun in having Papal Infallibility if you can’t do whatever the hell you want?

There’s no fanfare for his scheduled arrival, and most Czechs are more concerned with the mundane to really give a shit about the pontiff’s visit. Besides, he’s there to warn everyone of the “dangers” of secularism. Yeah, the world is such a messed up place in countries where religion and politics AREN’T intertwined, right? Oh wait, it’s completely the opposite. Silly me.

If the Pope really wants to do good, he should head over to Nigeria and try to put a stop to all the terrible shit that’s going on there in the name of Christianity. Hell, he could sanction the use of condoms and save millions of lives that way. What do you say Benny, ready to stop wasting your time and do some real good with your life? I didn’t think so.

Just a day after delivering a speech at Israel’s Holocaust Memorial (known as Yad Vashem) to a rather unimpressed crowd, the Vatican made a statement denying the Pope’s enrollment in the Hitler Youth, despite the fact Ratzinger had already admitted he had been a member of the Flakhelfer, the anti-aircraft auxiliary corps of the Hitler Youth.

The logic behind this obviously false statement is damage control after the Pope’s speech failed to make any impression on those in attendance, who felt the pontiff’s words were lukewarm, strategic, and generally uninspired. Many felt this may have been due to secret sympathies as a result of his previous Nazi connections. Although I won’t speculate as to the Pope’s true feelings, it does seem pretty fishy that he was so careful when choosing his words. It’s no secret a great deal of his flock are anti-Semitic, so it’s more than likely Benedict avoided admitting any serious culpability on the part of the Church.

Rather than issue a denial of something everyone knows to be true, the Vatican would be better off telling the truth rather than insultingly lie to everyone’s face. Of course, that would require honesty and integrity from the Church, and if you remember, this is the same institution that protected child molesters. Not exactly the best record for integrity, don’t you think?

I often say the Catholic Church is dangerously out of touch with reality. How could they not be; here is an institution that still clings to most of its doctrinal roots dating back fourteen centuries. They are now stuck with one of the worst Popes in recent history, who seems so isolated from reality he can’t even be bothered to notice what everyone is saying about him.

The biggest threat they face are the mounting deaths in Africa due to AIDS. The Papacy’s stance on condoms hasn’t changed since they were first invented; they believe contraception is wrong and condoms encourage promiscuity. Obviously, these guys never used condoms in their lives. Anyone who has put a rubber sheath on their penis will tell you it’s not generally a pleasant experience. It is one, however, that keeps you alive.

No one in the Vatican knows what to do about Ratzinger, who thanks to modern medicine, will probably live for another decade. Already 4 years in, he is regularly engaged in some kind of controversy. One day it’s forgiving a Holocaust denier, the next it’s making inflammatory remarks about Islam. Still, they voted him in knowing full well he used to be a Nazi youth. It also doesn’t help that he needed to be immunized by President Bush from prosecution in the US following the hundreds of child molestation charges for Catholic priests in the US. Ratzinger was in charge of the committee that was supposed to monitor it, and his solution was simply to bury the evidence, convince the families to shut up, and then to transfer the molesters to other towns where they offended again.

That’s your new Pope, folks. Still think the Church knows what it’s doing?

In the Western world, we are mostly isolated from the deadly effect of the AIDS virus. Those who have it usually don’t make much publicity for themselves, and some hide it completely. In Africa, however, the disease is a plague that is slowly killing off their population. It makes orphans of children who then starve to death; it cripples food production as farmers are too sick to properly harvest the land.

From his ivory tower, the Pope has continued to push his ‘no condoms’ agenda in Africa. He dares to call it an epidemic, but refuses to allow his Catholic followers to use condoms as a way of preventing millions of deaths on the false idea that his beloved God hates it when sperm is wasted. In case you were unaware of just why Catholics hate contraception, it’s mainly due to the Sin of Onan:

Onan was the son of Judah, and when his brother Er was killed by God (who smote him down because he was “wicked”, although there’s zero mention of his crimes), his father asked him to have sex with Er’s widow, Tamar. Well, Onan, like any healthy male, accepted, but before ejaculating he pulled out and spilled his man-seed on the ground. For that, God killed him, and the story now serves as the strongest evidence that God hates contraception.

Er and Onan are the only two guys that God kills directly without using intermediaries. It’s why Catholics take the story so fucking seriously. So, the epidemic, which could be controlled with the simple use of a rubber sheath over a man’s penis is rejected due to a crappy myth. That’s religion for you.

I’ve already talked about how corrupt and evil the Catholic Church is. All they seem to want to do recently is prove me right.