Pope's April Fool's joke falls flat

Pope Francis is said to be "fuming with rage" after this year's official April 1st joke (a long-standing tradition among popes) was released on March 31st, and was therefore taken seriously.

According to the spoof announcement, the Pope's apostolic exhortation based on the Synod on the Family was to be called "Amoris Laetitia" ("The joy of making love" - in itself an obvious give-away), and to be presented by Cardinal Lorenzo Baldisseri, Cardinal Christoph Schönborn, and "a very nice couple I met in the pub" called Francesco and Giuseppina Miano.

When a joke misfires...

"Do you really think I'd trust Baldisseri near my apostolic exhortation?" asked Francis angrily. "He's been manipulating the synod ever since it started, and he still hasn't explained what he did with all those books that went missing."

There is a rumour that Baldisseri hid several hundred copies of the book in the attic above his bedroom, and one night they all fell through onto him when he was sleeping in bed...

Cardinal Baldisseri's attic, before the great collapse.

"And then Schönborn? Schönborn? The man whose own diocese is a basket-case of heresy and dissent?" continued Pope Francis. "Well, I tried to think of someone ludicrous to accompany Baldisseri, but Kasper's started talking to trees and Danneels is preparing to go in hiding, so I thought that suggesting a man who blesses homosexual partnerships would bring the house down!"

Cardinal Schönborn's Flying Circus.

"Then I added Sid and Doris Bonkers - or whatever their names are - just to make things look a little more plausible," concluded the Pope. "Someone suggested 'Kieran Conry and partner', but that was a step too far."

As a result of the announcement's being made on March 31st, rather than April 1st, it is being taken seriously by the Catholic Church, and Pope Francis fears it is too late to rescind it. "Still, I've got another good joke for April 2017," he concluded cheerfully.

Pope Francis thinking about next year's April Fool's joke.

Protect the Pope allowed to resume

After two years of "voluntary" suspension, it is reported that Deacon Nick Donnelly's highly popular Protect the Pope blog is to restart operations. Older readers will remember that Deacon Nick was ordered by his bishop, Michael Campbell of Lancaster, to cease (voluntarily) from providing spiritual nourishment to the world, and instead withdraw for a period of prayer and reflection. Faithful to the Spirit of Humpty Dumpty, "When I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean," +Mike explained that this did not mean that he had shut down Protect the Pope.

Apparently, bishops themselves have no need to spend time in prayer and reflection, for the bishop's own hard-hitting blog continues to flourish, and is regarded as the best place on the Internet to find pictures of a bishop having tea with nuns.

Michael Campbell is lost in admiration.

According to reports, Bishop Campbell has been a guilty, tortured person ever since he didn't close down Protect the Pope. For two years he has lain awake at nights, thinking of the deacon he wronged. Although he tried reading the works of Tina Beattie, Timothy Radcliffe and even Michael Coren, he still found it difficult to get to sleep. In vain he tried to atone by saintly actions such as giving St. Walburge's church, Preston, to the Institute of Christ the King Sovereign Priest, and by rebuking the dissident group ACTA, but the one great wrong he had committed (or not committed) remained unrighted.

We are currently enjoying the Year of Mercy, and this also seems to have pushed Michael Campbell in the direction of a reprieve for PtP. After all, nobody wants to go down in history as "Mike the Merciless", least of all a bishop.

Flash Gordon's Ming the Merciless. Unpopular in the Catholic Church this year.

Since Deacon Donnelly's voluntary suspension in 2014, the Catholic Church has been effectively rudderless. Pope Francis himself has been unwilling to give coherent moral leadership, except on rare occasions, and, as for Vincent Nichols, well you "might as well ask the cat", in the immortal words of Basil Fawlty. Now that the Superdeacon is back, it should not be long before the Pope is properly protected again, and the wicked are put to flight. Or something.

New vestments for the Bishop of Lancaster

Eccles outs himself

Well, it had to come. I couldn't keep my identity secret much longer: one or two people had already begun to guess who "Eccles" was. It's time to confess.

Yes, Eccles is Fr John Zuhlsdorf, priest, blogger, and licensed to kill.

When you think about it, it is obvious that Eccles could be nobody else. Why does Eccles never post comments on Fr Z's blog? Why does Fr Z never mention Eccles? Of course... it's simply modesty.

Look at Fr Z's blog today. You see a brilliant post, asserting that SSPX is setting up an ordinariate for disaffected traddy Catholics. Doesn't the style look familiar?

What the well-dressed priest is packing.

Admittedly, some people thought that "Eccles" was really Damian Thompson, Tina Beattie, Giles Fraser or Richard Dawkins - why else would he give publicity to such obscure individuals? But no, these were merely comic characters introduced to make the blog more spiritually nourishing.

Well, the game is up now, so, apart from reminding you always to Say the Red and Do the Black, and to stock up on Mysterious Monk Coffee, I say goodbye for now.

The ideal gift for a liberal Catholic.