How to be a good pagan pope

This is of course the latest instalment in our series "How to be a good pope", providing essential advice for anyone expecting to be launched into the Chair of St Peter. (However, be warned, Pope Francis is taking the 93+ years of Leo XIII and Benedict XVI as a challenge, and has lots of exciting plans for making the Catholic Church unrecognizable in the next ten years...)

"Thank you for sending me the idol of Pachamama. I have thrown it into the Tiber."

It's been a frustrating summer, and you haven't been able to hold your usual audiences in front of great crowds, nor to take aeroplane trips (your usual opportunity for inventing new doctrine). True, you had another chat with Scalfari, who at 96 is even older than Benedict and Leo, even if he does make everything up from memory. But it turned out to be a bit of a non-event.

You were so desperate for company that you were reduced to allowing Austen Ivereigh to interview you - somehow he misunderstood your groans of "Let me sleep!" when he phoned you up at 3 a.m., and he is going to call the resulting book "Let us dream!" (Memo: remind Austen to brush up his Italian.) More on that some other time.

No, seriously...

Well, you amused yourself a little by tinkering with the Italian liturgy. The bits quoted from the Bible always looked wrong to you, so you were happy to rewrite them in the way Jesus would have put things if he'd been as wise as you. But this is merely trolling the traditionalists, so you need something bigger to keep yourself in the public eye.

Got it! For the next month we're going to celebrate the Jubilee for the Earth, the Season of Creation. That is, paganism. Here are a couple of wise things you might preach. Don't mention Jesus, sin, redemption, Heaven, Hell, or any of that stuff. It just confuses people.

What's that strange voice I hear?

Listen carefully, folks, that's the voice of creation speaking. Forget all that nonsense about being masters of creation - rewriting Genesis is next on your list - and remember that we are all spiders in a web, not just your friend Tony Spidero.

I got rhythm...

Speak out about the rhythms of creation. You may go down in history as the rhythmical pope, which is better than the web-bound pope. However, be warned: one of your likely successors, Cardinal Taggle-Waggle, is already putting in a claim to be the most rhythmical pope, and his dance moves are better than yours.

"I got rhythm AND I got music."

Anyway, keep muttering about the Rhythms of the Earth, the Jubilee of Creation, the Season of the Voice, the Voice of the Season, the Creation of Rhythm, and the Jubilee of the Season of Creation of the Rhythms of the Voice of the Earth... and that will keep people in a state of confusion until your next encyclical gets written.

More letters to the Catholic Herald

For an eclectic mix of lunacy and wisdom, there are few sources like the Catholic Herald letters page, so here are some recent highlights.

"Fun" before Mass.

Your idiot of a correspondent thinks that the bedlam in many Catholic churches before and after Mass can be justified because "God doesn't mind". So bad have things come that I was told off by a priest last week because my silent prayer was disturbing those who were trying to text, gossip, laugh and play games of darts. Apparently it was putting a damper on the occasion.

Those sacred minutes before Mass starts.

Indeed, I was warned that kneeling down and looking solemn was definitely a "holier-than-thou" attitude, not welcome in the Church of St Daryl the Apostate. Apparently, Fr Phil is making lots of exciting innovations, including a side-chapel where money-changers may operate, plus the opportunity to buy doves symbolizing the Spirit of Vatican II. I don't know about you, but this makes me feel vaguely uncomfortable.

Pastor Juventus F.C.

Faithful Catholics love the EU.

Stands to reason, dunnit, guv? Ever since Pope Leo III crowned Charlemagne as Holy Roman Emperor in 800 A.D., and the new emperor used his powers to deal with the pressing problems of curved bananas and mislabelled prunes, it has been clear that pious Catholics must support ever-closer European union.

Over the years several good Catholics such as Napoléon Bonaparte and Adolf Hitler have tried to unify Europe, knowing that this was God's will. What's more, we should listen to the wise words of Pope Francis, which exhort us to believe in climate change, to give the Falkland Islands to Argentina, and to support the San Lorenzo football club. When popes make such statements it is a refreshing change from all the usual boring stuff about religion, and we should take their words seriously.

"Supporters of other teams cannot be saved" says the Pope.

Yes, make no mistake, people who oppose having their laws made by corrupt, overpaid and unelected bureaucrats in Brussels are DAMNED. What's more, the Catholic Bishops' Conference in Mordor Square agrees with me!

Fr Cloud Cuckoo-Land.

Sack Ronnie Rolheiser!

Every week Ronald Rolheiser's column is entitled "The last word", but unfortunately he's always back again the following week. And he writes such drivel...

Eccles.

The heart sinks (and what do Ron's hand gestures mean?)

And finally, a cheap shot from a Scots Nat.

Your correspondent writes, "In England we are preparing for a referendum on the EU." He didn't mention Scotland, and that proves that we nationalists won the independence vote. When we go to Heaven we shall feast on porridge and haggis, while praising God on the bagpipes. Och Aye!

Rabbi Burns.

Praise the Lord upon the badly-tuned bagpipes!