Go Wide

Apr 22, 2:34 PM EDT
New Pope Has First Meeting with Cardinals by BRIAN MURPHY, AP Religion Writer

In a surprise move, the new Pope, Benny (with a whole bunch of numbers) announced he was planning on meeting with Denny Green, the Head Coach of the Arizona Cardinals. It seems the new Papal dude is a huge fan of the Cardinals and felt that with the departure of Emmet Smith, he might be able to try out with the team as a running back. In the event this was not a possibility, there is talk of his Eminence becoming the team mascot, since he has all the really ‘cool’ outfits.

This came as a huge shock to the New Orleans Saints, since they assumed they had the ‘inside track’ on signing the Pope to a 1-year contract as a float in one of the Mardi Gras parades. The Whiner will certainly keep all of you informed of the ongoing discussions. Should a deal be struck, there will be a smoke signal sent up by the local Navajo tribe to announce the selection of a new mascot.

There are some things a writer should just leave alone…the Big Two, of course, are: politics and religion. These would also be the two groups that do more to lull us into a false sense of well being while picking our pockets. That being said, I would like to wade into the arena of religion for just a moment.

I have spent almost every waking moment of my life attempting to get a grasp of who God is and how He fits into my life. I have been everything from a Born Again Christian to a Mormon. I have tried Shamanism, Buddhism, and have taken a run at Ron L. Hubbard’s Church of Scientology. In most cases, I have failed to achieve any true sense of finding an inner peace that seems to satisfy the relentless need to find God.

Through the years of reading the Bible and so on, I always get very confused on the Catholic Church. I’m never very clear who is ‘in charge.’ I sometimes think the main focus is on the Pope and so on. Not sure where God got shuffled off to, but it must have something to do with some sort of pecking order, I guess. I was reading the other day where a group of Catholics were flocking to a water stain in Chicago. It looked like the Virgin Mary. How odd?

You actually pray to a water stain to reach God? I have apparently made far too much of my search. I need to pay closer attention to the plumbing, perhaps? If this form of religion had more organizational layers, it would qualify as the IRS.

The other part I don’t get, can you really ‘head up’ a church by being elected? I mean at 78 years old? C’mon, you can be the leader of a religion and yet, you can’t figure out how to program your VCR?

But hey, I could be wrong.