Political Irony

© Kevin Siers

If the Catholic Church isn’t going to look to the future, how about going all the way back to the past?

Ed Stein has a novel idea:

It’s time for the Church to think outside the box. Pope Benedict is the first Pope to resign in six centuries. If you’re going to go back to old traditions, why not go all the way back to the beginning? All the early disciples were Jewish. Saint Peter, the founder of the Church, was Jewish. Why not a Jewish Pope?

Look, at a time when the Catholic Church seems focused on losing as much influence as possible in the West, what better way to accelerate the trend than to appoint a rabbi as Pope? Let’s face it: nobody listens to rabbis.

Oh, sure, virtually every congregation has one, and rabbis perform essential functions like giving sermons and officiating at bar mitzvahs and weddings and funerals, but no matter how many times they ask their congregants to keep kosher and not work or shop on the sabbath or fast on Yom Kippur, they’re pretty much universally ignored.

Also, because the rabbinate doesn’t answer to a central authority, priests under a Jewish Pope would be a lot more free to deal with the individual needs of their own congregations without the heavy hand of Rome interfering all the time. So each individual congregation would be free to ignore its own rabbi rather than having to go to the trouble of tuning out the entire Vatican.

Finally, a Jewish Pope would most likely be married. Getting rid of the absurd prohibition against priests marrying would go a long way toward putting the whole ugly pedophile scandal to rest for good. Rabbis, unlike priests, actually have some experience with marriage and sex, and a Jewish Pope would not have a lot of patience with priests who torment boys. He would understand that that’s a job reserved for Jewish mothers, and that the abuse should be entirely emotional, not physical.

Besides, this way nobody could ever accuse the Catholic church of being anti-semitic. And it would also build a bridge to protestant evangelicals, who lately seem to be obsessed with Israel. I think it is an idea whose time has come.

“People are still trying to figure out why the power went out Sunday at the Super Bowl. Today they found out the reason. Turns out China cut off the electricity for nonpayment of our bill.” – Jay Leno

“The power went out for 35 minutes in the Superdome. It was the most highly viewed power outage since Obama’s first debate with Romney.” – David Letterman

“Pakistan is opening an amusement park and a zoo in the same town where the raid on Osama Bin Laden took place. The zoo is pretty cool, but I’ve heard you won’t be able to see the seals until it’s too late.” – Jimmy Fallon

“A Justice Department memo claims that President Obama has the right to order the assassination of an American anywhere in the world. Isn’t that crazy? In a related story, Donald Trump has gone into hiding.” – Conan O’Brien

“The White House is warning North Korea that it will face significant consequences if it moves forward with a new round of nuclear tests. Not only that — it’s also warning South Korea that it will face serious consequences if Psy makes another ad for pistachios.” – Jimmy Fallon

“Scientists have found the remains of England’s King Richard III under a parking lot. Unfortunately, they couldn’t find his ticket. So he’ll be charged the day rate.” – Conan O’Brien

“Two prostitutes from the Dominican Republic say that New Jersey Senator Bob Menendez paid them for sex. And Menendez is in big trouble because as you know it is a felony to impersonate a Secret Service agent.” – Jay Leno

“Hispanics and Republicans go together like beans and very very white rice that is highly suspicious of the beans.” – Stephen Colbert (on Republican claims that the Hispanic vote should belong to the GOP)

“A new study just came out and it reveals that straight men who watch porn are more likely to support same-sex marriage. The study also found that straight men who don’t watch porn are lying.” – Conan O’Brien

“Last night was one of the highest rated Super Bowls ever, with 108 million people watching. This year’s game added $430 million to the New Orleans economy — apparently none of which was used to pay the electric bill.” – Jimmy Fallon

“A power outage during a Super Bowl in Louisiana — but don’t worry. FEMA said they will be there no later than Thursday.” – David Letterman

“The lights in the Superdome went out for 33 minutes at the beginning of the third quarter. The 49ers were just standing around on the field, not knowing what to do — and then the blackout happened.” – Jimmy Fallon

“The lights went out in the third quarter, which is weird because normally I don’t experience a blackout until after a Super Bowl party.” – Jimmy Fallon

“U.S. employers just added 157,000 jobs to the economy. Of course, most of those were for backup dancers for Beyoncé.” – Conan O’Brien

“Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said he would like to become the first Iranian to go into space. And today Israel said, ‘Flight’s on us! No problem. We’ve got everything covered.'” – Jay Leno

“Fox News has their lowest ratings in 10 years. But Fox says it’s not a case of them losing credibility. They say it’s not because they’re now widely seen as a clearing house for discredited ideas. They say it’s mostly because of old people misplacing the clicker.” – Bill Maher

“Con men like Rush and Beck are one reason the Republicans are in such dire straits today. Because they don’t care about winning elections. They care about separating rubes from their money. They’ve discovered there’s a fortune to be made by keeping a small portion of America under the illusion that they are always under attack. From Mexicans, or ACORN, or Planned Parenthood, or gays, or takers, global warming hoaxers; it doesn’t matter. They don’t want a majority. They want a mailing list, a list of the kind of gullible Honey Boo Boos out there who think that there’s a War on Christmas, and that the socialist policies of our Kenyan President have been so disastrous that the end of the world is coming.” – Bill Maher

“The Dow hit 14,000. It hasn’t been that high since 2007, heading toward an all-time high. Just think of how big it would be if Obama wasn’t such a socialist.” – Bill Maher

“Here’s some news out of Washington. Today, President Obama honored more than 20 researchers for their contributions to science and technology. Unfortunately, it was overshadowed by the football game – or as those researchers put it, ‘Man, high school never ends, does it?'” – Jimmy Fallon

“In an interview last week, Obama said he loves to shoot skeet up at Camp David. Republicans said if he is a skeet shooter, why have we not heard of it? Why have we not seen photos of it? Yes, because nothing would ease the Republican mind more than a photo of the black president with a gun.” – Bill Maher

“This is the first day of Black History Month; or as Republicans call it, February.” – Bill Maher

“Immigration is the big issue they’re working on in Washington. They want to create a ‘path to citizenship’. You have to pass a background check, you have to pay a fine, you have to pay back taxes, you have to learn English and you have to get that statue of the Virgin Mary off your front yard. Oh, and also the cable channels between 17 and 23 – gone.” – Bill Maher

“I would urge the Republicans who are still not behind this to consider the alternative; picking our own damn strawberries.” – Bill Maher

“Senator Bob Menendez was caught in a little scandal. Apparently he’s been going down to Puerto Rico and getting underage prostitutes. He denies it. But he says the path to citizenship passes through his pants.” – Bill Maher

“The Daily Caller website found two women in Puerto Rico, who claim that he promised them $500 for their services and only paid them $100. This is my kind of Senator – socially liberal and fiscally conservative.” – Bill Maher

“The director of Jewish outreach for the White House announced that he is stepping down. He says it’s time to move on, while his mother says he’s still a real catch and other presidents would be lucky to have him.” – Jimmy Fallon

“Beyoncé finally admitted that she did lip sync the national anthem during the inauguration. Now Donald Trump is claiming that since she did lip sync, President Obama is not legally president. He said it invalidated the whole thing.” – Jay Leno

“I love this story; the state of Washington is now looking for a marijuana consultant now that marijuana is legal up there. I think this is one of those green jobs President Obama is always talking about.” – Jay Leno