His last word was “Rosebud”, but he was probably talking about his first altar boy.
—notmydesk, MetaFilter
In a shocking new development, it recently emerged from the Vatican that Pope John Paul II, who died a few hours ago, is still dead.
Heh, look, sorry for that. I feel a sense of great occasion about this death in particular, as I’m sure many others do, religious or not. However, I think a lot of it is overblown and I cannot bring myself to feel sad. I didn’t know the man, and I have my own (on balance, negative) opinions about how the Catholic Church he led influences individuals and the world.
Which is why I can’t help feeling that all the crying and so on is rather… misplaced somehow; this is one old man, an 86–year–old virgin, who has died, not a whole town or villageful of people during a war. Undoubtedly the person of the Pope — that is, the Papal office — has ceased to exist for a while, and that is why many Catholics and others will feel disturbed and rootless.
The arcane and purposeful procedures now to be set in place, however, will soon set people’s emotions to rights. I’ve always been interested in what happens when a Pope or someone equally important dies: to meditate for a second, it’s just very interesting to see loads of homo sapiens clustering round a more important homo sapiens in its life or after its death, to see what happens…
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