On June 14, Pope Francis is scheduled to meet 105 comedians from 15 countries. Americans who have been invited include Jim Gaffigan, Conan O’Brien, Chris Rock, Tig Notaro and Whoopi Goldberg. The meeting is being arranged by the Vatican’s Dicastery for Culture and Education and the Dicastery for Communication. Their goal is to “establish a link between the Catholic Church and comic artists.”
Perhaps it would be good to vet these comedians before introducing them to the pope. Then again it may not matter.
We have nothing to say about Jim Gaffigan or Chris Rock. But the others have said things about Catholics that should have been picked up by the members of these two dicasteries.
Stephen Colbert has compared the Eucharist to Doritos. “I know the Eucharist is usually bread, but through transubstantiation it becomes the Body of Christ, so I honestly don’t understand why Jesus can’t be a Dorito?” He has mocked Catholic objections to President Obama’s plan to force the Little Sisters of the Poor to pay for contraceptives and abortion-inducing drugs in their healthcare plan. “Catholic groups are forced to provide contraceptives, but the pope wants his hat to be the only thing with a reservoir tip.” His show also depicted a priest distributing condoms instead of the consecrated Host.
Jimmy Fallon has smeared priests. “A priest in Italy has developed a new app that will let priests say Mass on their iPods. Yeah, altar boys are quickly learning the difference between itouch and bad touch.”
Conan O’Brien has portrayed all priests as molesters. “Kids can opt out of fondling by texting #nothanks to the Vatican.”
Whoopi Goldberg, who has had 6 or 7 abortions (she is not sure), has made a slew of attacks on priests, and has ripped Pope John Paul II for rejecting homosexuality and abortion. “Who the f**k is the pope to judge people like that?”
Tig Notaro claims she married a woman in 2015 and it was blessed by a deacon. She said of Jesus that he “was a woman and her pantsuits would blow your feeble-f**king minds.”
Some of those who serve on the dicasteries that invited these people are known to us.
On the Dicastery for Culture and Education are Jean-Claude Hollerich, archbishop of Luxembourg, and Cardinal Joseph Tobin, archbishop of Newark.
Hollerich has said that the official Catholic teaching on homosexuality is “no longer correct.” Cardinal Tobin agrees, saying the language is “very unfortunate.”
On the Dicastery for Communications is Cardinal Marcello Semeraro. Serving as a Consulter is Father James Martin.
Cardinal Semeraro, who was recently appointed by the pope to serve on the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, wrote a preface to a book by a priest called, Possible Love: Homosexual Persons and Christian Morality.
Father James Martin, who is the poster priest for the LGBT cause, rejects the term “intrinsically disordered” to describe homosexuals, saying it makes them feel “subhuman.”
When all of these people meet, it makes us wonder who will have the last laugh.
