Wednesday, April 15th, 2026
- If I could be said to have any religion at all, it would most likely be Catholicism, as that’s the one I grew up in. My grandparents were so Catholic that meat was forbidden on Fridays even though that was never a thing outside of Lent since 1966. However, in the words of George Carlin, “I used to be Catholic, now I’m an American. You know, you grow…”
Even when I was at the worst part of my “God is dead and no one cares”, phase in my teens and twenties, I never–NEVER–had a bad word to say about John Paul II, especially early young Commie Killer Karol, JP2. Maybe I should have, looking back at it. We gave Sinead no end of shit, but it turns out we really did her dirty. That said, I never would have tried to Popesplain the man. That leads me to a question that’s been on my mind all day: What in the liturgical fuck was Couch McEyeliner thinking? What the fuck was the Preacher of the House thinking? My brothers in Christ, are you insane? I mean, I understand if Ratzinger was more your speed, but C’mon.
It’s the arrogance for me, dude. Here’s a story from 20-ish years ago: I was working for a contractor for Verizon, selling and servicing DSL for the home. I was a workforce guy back then, and I worked with this guy named Rich. Rich was a born again Christian, assistant pastor at one of the many strip malls of the Lord we have around here. This is fall of 2004, my grandmother is not long for the world, and I’m really broken up about it. I ended up talking about this with Rich one morning, and he asked what religion she was. I said Catholic, he said I’m sorry, I repeated myself, and he said “I heard you, I said I was sorry.” He meant he was sorry my grandmother was Catholic. I flew over the cubicle wall at this motherfucker, and they literally had to drag me away. The fucking balls on this guy. They moved me to another building in the complex to keep me from strangling this asshole, thankfully there were other people who heard this exchange and stood up for me. If you ever needed any justification on why some people think Evangelicals are trash human beings, let that be Exhibit A. This story ends exactly how you think it ends. Rich disappeared. He didn’t quit. He was arrested. He was incarcerated. Would you like to guess why? I bet you can get it in one.
The Pope doesn’t need anyone’s advice, especially those two jackballs. Why don’t you have a Coke, a smile, and a fucking seat.
