Archbishop Fisichella excommunicates the Pope

Following his claim that critics of the Pope faced automatic excommunication - the sort of "merciful" statement that we expect to hear a lot of in the next few months - Archbishop Fisichella, President of the Pontifical Council for New Evangelization, today revealed that he had excommunicated Pope Francis himself. It is believed to be the first occasion since the middle ages on which an occupant of the Chair of St Peter has suffered this indignity.

"Maybe I hadn't really thought this out."

Apparently the Holy Father was overheard commenting that he had greatly sinned, in his thoughts and in his words, in what he had done and in what he had failed to do, through his fault, through his fault, through his most grievous fault. "Now, if any other Catholic had said this of the Pope," said Fisichella, "perhaps Bones or Mundabor, then they would have been in deep trouble. So it is only fair to punish Francis for this vicious attack on himself."

LATE NEWS: Pope Francis has been forgiven.

Meanwhile, in Rome...

Yesterday, the start of the Jubilee Year of Mercy, was also the Feast of the Immaculate Conception. The Vatican chose to mark this by using St Peter's Basilica as a projection screen, showing a range of Pope Francis's favourite wildlife.

St Quasimodo of Notre Dame.

However, Disney, threatened by the possibility that the Vatican could soon be showing Tom and Jerry cartoons on St Peter's, has responded with a display of scenes from the Jungle Book.

Shere Khan the tiger.

Gosh, this year of Mercy is going to be interesting.