Oh, joy!

The last cardinal who will participate in the conclave to elect the next pope arrived in Rome on Thursday, meaning a date can now be set for the election.

The fun is about to begin! I tell you, I'm all fired up. A new popey guy! What fun it'll be to play with him, no matter who he turns out to be. Speaking of the election, who do you think they'll choose? Here are my thoughts.

First off, I doubt they'll pick me as the new pope. For a while, I thought there was an outside chance. But no. I've accepted this. Moving on to other possible candidates, I think the cardinals' childish understanding of sexuality, coupled with the church's monstrous history of preying upon children, will drive them to choose the worst possible candidate.

Yup, I'm talkin' Turkson. A gay-hating, totally straight African pope who's ready to trounce on nuns and other feminine and feminine-like atrocities such as gay people -- would appeal to these cardinals, all of whom were appointed by Ratzinger based on their thick-headedness. 

Or they could go the Disney route and pick Timmy Dolan. I know people are poo-pooing this notion but I think Timmy's got a good chance. After all, he honcho'd the church's pogrom against gays in the US. And he seems to be trying, of late, to become the Mr. Rogers of cardinals. I mean, have you heard the stuff he's said lately? He sounds like Tinkerbell on PCP.

Anyway, those are my two faves for the job of Popey Guy of Planet Earth. What do you think? Got any hot candidates? I'm not familiar with all the cardinals (and neither are they), so there could be another gem in the bunch. But however it goes, we are in for some newfangled fun! Hooray for the (next) popey guy!

Ghanian cardinal a real treat

This cardinal could be an even worse pope than Ratzi. Cardinal Peter Turkson of Ghana is said to be in the running to take over Ratzi's job. And this one is seriously off the beam.

Then, the conversation turned to the Catholic Church's sex abuse scandal. Amanpour asked Turkson if it's possible the scandal, which swept across the U.S. and Europe over the past decade, could reach Africa. 

"Not in the same proportion as we have seen in Europe," Turkson said. "Probably because African traditional systems kind of protect or have protected its population against this tendency. Because in several communities, in several cultures in Africa, homosexuality, or for that matter, any affair between two sexes of the same kind are not countenanced in our society. So, that cultural 'taboo,' that tradition has been there. It's helped to keep this out." 

Got that? His country's dedication to oppressing gays protected it from pedophilia. As the linked HuffPo article states, "The 64-year-old Ghanaian cardinal has displayed anti-gay sentiments before, defending anti-gay legislation similar to Uganda's so-called "Kill the Gays" bill." Great. A new gay-hating pope. Even the church, as an institution, doesn't think the pedophilia scandal is the result of gays moving into the priesthood. A five-year study undertaken by the bishops discounted this possibility.

The report notes that homosexual men began entering the seminaries “in noticeable numbers” from the late 1970s through the 1980s. By the time this cohort entered the priesthood, in the mid-1980s, the reports of sexual abuse of minors by priests began to drop and then to level off. If anything, the report says, the abuse decreased as more gay priests began serving the church.

So let's see...gays enter the priest workforce and pedophilia is reduced. Seems simple, no? Not to this brain-challenged cardinal.

But don't worry. Italian newspapers seem to think that smiling Timmy Dolan of NYC, who was deposed on Wednesday about the pedophilia scandal, has a good shot at being the next pope. Oh, wait. That would mean the fellow who honchoed the American Catholic bishops' vicious vendetta against gays could be the next pope. Hmmm...Turkson or Dolan. Doesn't seem to make much difference, does it? Interesting times ahead!