What could the new Pope say to get my vote and admiration? Maybe something like this.
Dear people, Catholics and non Catholics alike my church has done you a great disservice in the past; we have craved and sought things that are beneath contempt for an organization representing the Spirit of God. We have shared the same worldly values as the most materialistically minded criminals and dictators, we have poisoned the ponds of Holy Water with debauchery, barbarism and disillusionment, we have sold God’s Word to the highest bidder, we have fleeced the people for filthy lucre at every opportunity.
For this we are truly sorry, so with humble heart in hand we now seek to make amends, it is time for the Catholic Church to repent in sackcloth and ashes for its numerous crimes against both God and His children of all denominations and nations. As a start we will be burning our resplendent finery; everything from our top hats to our itty bitty slippers are going into the conflagration nothing will be spared, our pompous attitudes and habit of calling each other “your eminence” will also be added to the great and purifying fire.
We will be selling all of our properties and assets of every type nothing will be held back from the auctioneers axe and all sales are final. We have amassed great wealth by deceiving the people who trusted us to save their eternal souls and now it is time to return our ill gotten gains strangled from those we have misused so deceitfully.
All of the bishops are being demoted and sent out penniless to wander the earth in search of redemption if that is even possible now. We offer ourselves and our church back to those from whom we have stolen it, we made a mockery of the Christ with our ostentatious and thieving ways; we built monuments to our greatness in defiance of God’s will, we piled our stones high, we over decorated the alters to command respect from men and in so doing denied the supremacy of God.
We are guilty of every spiritual crime; we are a good example of what happens when wolves in sheep’s clothing are put in charge of the henhouse and we deeply regret all the damage we have done since becoming a church. As I look back on our history I can’t help feeling that we are representative not of Christ’s humble teachings but of something more sinister, Christianity did not conquer Rome that is only a ruse, a tawdry fabrication because in reality Rome won the battle and has used the church to accomplish its purposes into the 21st Century.
And so I bid you adieu, I will be handing over my Pope gear to the flames I only hope that it helps ease the burdens we have so cruelly imposed on the people’s of the world by pretending to be what we are not; God’s church. We all humbly ask your forgiveness in Jesus name Amen.