Pope Trumps Donald

Winging back to Rome after his visit to Ciudad Juárez on the Mexico-US border, reporters asked Pope Francis what he thought of the idea of building a wall between the United States and Mexico. “A person who thinks only about building walls, wherever they may be, and not building bridges, is not Christian,” His Holiness replied. “This is not the gospel.”

That “person,” of course, would be reality TV star, fear monger and Bible scholar Donald J. Trump. Naturally The Donald picked a fight with the Pope, claiming Mexican officials got Pope Francis to say that (so they won’t have to pay for Donald’s wall, no doubt). Then he claimed the Pope had no right to impugn his Christian faith, as if his own words hadn’t done so already.

Pope Francis has decried the suffering of migrants in Europe and the Mid East as well as on Mexico’s northern border. Maybe those walls can be Trump-branded, too.

More:

“The Pope Is Way More Popular Than Donald Trump,” Leah Libresco and Nate Silver, FiveThirtyEight

___________________

Short Link: http://wp.me/p6sb6-ndZ

Image by Mike Licht. Download a copy here. Creative Commons license; credit Mike Licht, NotionsCapital.com

Comments are welcome if they are on-topic, substantive, concise, and not boring or obscene. Comments may be edited for clarity and length.

Add to: Facebook | Digg | Del.icio.us | Stumbleupon | Reddit | Blinklist | Twitter | Technorati | Yahoo Buzz | Newsvine

Pope in the USA: Punk’d by a Tea Party Saint, Hugged Gay Guys

When Everybody’s favorite pontiff, Pope Francis, visited Washington DC in September he had a secret meeting with intolerant, oath-breaking Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis and her current husband. It was a secret to His Holiness, anyway, who had no earthly idea who Mrs. Davis is. She was apparently one of many people he greeted during his Vatican Embassy stay.

Pope Francis didn’t set up the meeting; it was arranged by papal nucio Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò, the Vatican’s envoy to the US, who was sent to the States by former Pope Benedict XVI to keep him from meddling in Vatican City politics. Archbishop Viganò turns 75 in a few months and is expected to be “retired” by the current pontiff.

While in DC Pope Francis met with a same-sex couple, Washington caterer Yayo Grassi and his long-time partner Iwan Bagus. His Holiness had personally invited Mr. Grassi, his former student at Colegio de la Inmaculada Concepción in Argentina, to a private audience, and there were hugs all around.

Lawyers for Kim Davis from the Falwell-affiliated Liberty Counsel claimed that the Pope’s off-the-cuff comments on conscientious objectors referred to their client, but the Vatican denied this, and many have observed that the county clerk is not a CO since she forced her beliefs on her deputies rather than letting them act on their own. Papal spokesmen have emphasized that the Papal greeting was not a show of support for the delinquent Rowan County clerk.

The Pope’s Jumbotron

Pope Francis will address a Joint Session of Congress when he visits Washington DC on September 24, 2015. Since ticket demand greatly exceeds the capacity of the Capitol House Chamber, huge Jumbotron screens will be set up on the National Mall so tens of thousands of fans and the faithful can see and hear the Pope in real time.

After his Congressional speech, His Holiness will briefly address the crowds outside from the Capitol’s West Front while his Swiss Guards stand on the Capitol steps and fire T-Shirt Guns, pelting the throng with souvenir garb and  panini imbottito. Okay, they won’t, but they should, right?

After concluding his visit to Washington, Pope Francis will fly to New York so he can get a decent slice of pizza.

____________________

Short Link: http://wp.me/p6sb6-lDH

Image by Mike Licht. Download a copy here. Creative Commons license; credit Mike Licht, NotionsCapital.com

Comments are welcome if they are on-topic, substantive, concise, and not boring or obscene. Comments may be edited for clarity and length

Add to: Facebook | Digg | Del.icio.us | Stumbleupon | Reddit | Blinklist | Twitter | Technorati | Yahoo Buzz | Newsvine

Pope’s Motorcycle Sells for $327,000

A Harley Davidson Dyna Super Glide motorcycle owned by Pope Francis sold for $327,000 at an auction in Paris. That’s 20 times it’s estimated value. A leather jacket also donated by His Holiness sold for $68,000. Proceeds will go to a charity hostel and soup kitchen in Rome.

Note: You’ll find slightly different sale prices reported by different news outlets. The media, unlike the Pope, are not infallible.

The Pope’s Harley

Last June His Holiness Pope Francis was presented with a customized 1,585cc Harley-Davidson Dyna Super Glide by the manufacturer to to mark the motorcycle brand’s 110th anniversary. The Holy Hog will be auctioned by Bonhams in Paris on February 6th and proceeds will go the toward renovation of a hostel and soup kitchen run by Caritas Roma.

You may recall that Pope Francis doesn’t like to use the “Popemobile” limousines and drives himself around Vatican City in a secondhand Renault 4L. After he auctions off the Harley, maybe he can find himself a nice used Vespa.

Actually, H-D gave the Pope a leather Harley jacket (not the one pictured above) and that’s on the block, too.

The Pope is on Twitter.

Pope Benedict XVI is on Twitter, tweeting encyclicals in 140 CXL letters. Actually, His Holiness was on the Twitter last year, about the same time he went on Facebook, but this is his very own personal account, and his handle is @Pontifex. Twitter Followers: 1,104,394, Following: 0.  That’s your Vatican table of organization right there.

But Twitter works in mysterious ways. The Pope invited questions to the hashtag #askpontifex, unleashing a flood of tweeted inquiries about faith, sex, scandal and lunch. More queries of the curia curious can be found here and here.

More:

“To Tweet the Infallible Tweet,” Steven Mazie, Big Think

___________

Short link: http://wp.me/p6sb6-fcR

Image by Mike Licht. Download a copy here. Creative Commons license; credit Mike Licht, NotionsCapital.com

Comments are welcome if they are on-topic, substantive, concise, and not boring or obscene. Comments may be edited for clarity and length.

Add to: Facebook | Digg | Del.icio.us | Stumbleupon | Reddit | Blinklist | Twitter | Technorati | Yahoo Buzz | Newsvine

The Pope Tweets

Pope Benedict XVI is on Twitter. Well, he will be before the end of the year, anyway.

Actually, His Holiness was on the Twitter last year, about the same time he went on Facebook, but this will be his very own account.

We look forward to reading encyclicals written in 140 CXL letters.

More:

“Pope Benedict to guide followers with personal Twitter account,” Amanda Holpuch, The Guardian

___________

Short link: http://wp.me/p6sb6-eY1

Image by Mike Licht. Download a copy here. Creative Commons license; credit Mike Licht, NotionsCapital.com

Comments are welcome if they are on-topic, substantive, concise, and not boring or obscene. Comments may be edited for clarity and length.

Add to: Facebook | Digg | Del.icio.us | Stumbleupon | Reddit | Blinklist | Twitter | Technorati | Yahoo Buzz | Newsvine

The Pope is on Twitter

His Holiness Pope Benedict XVI fired up his iPad II and used L’Osservatore Romano‘s Twitter account to hype the Vatican online news portal:

 “Dear Friends, I just launched http://www.news.va. Praised be our Lord Jesus Christ! With my prayers and blessings, Benedictus XVI.”

122 characters. Oh, pardon, that’s CXXII.

And you don’t have to be Catholic to follow Pope Benedict. Mirabile dictu, he’s on Facebook.

More:

“One Small Tweet for Pope….” Rocco Palmo, Whispers in the Loggia

Image by Mike Licht. Download a copy here. Creative Commons license; credit Mike Licht, NotionsCapital.com

Comments are welcome if they are on-topic, substantive, concise, and not boring or obscene. Comments may be edited for clarity and length.

Add to: Facebook | Digg | Del.icio.us | Stumbleupon | Reddit | Blinklist | Twitter | Technorati | Yahoo Buzz | Newsvine