The book meme in which the pope shoots himself

The Atheist Blogger just tagged everyone who read his post with a book meme and since I actually have a book near my desk this morning, I decided not to ignore him.

The Rules:

1. Grab the nearest book.
2. Open the book to page 56.
3. Find the fifth sentence.
4. Post the text of the next seven sentences in your journal along with these instructions.
5. Don’t dig for your favourite book, the cool book, or the intellectual one: pick the CLOSEST.

The book near me this morning just happens to one of my favourites. It’s The Happy Heretic by Judith Hayes who writes a monthly column at, you guessed it, The Happy Heretic.  Her columns have always made me smile as did the seven sentences on page 56 of her book:

Using a .22 Ruger, Pope John Paul II scored a bull’s-eye with a through and through wound at the base of the middle toe of his left foot. In a stunningly medieval, unenlightened Apostolic Letter titled “In Order to Defend the Faith,” the pontiff carved into stone via Canon Law the bans on birth control, women priests, voluntary euthanasia, and teaching mynah birds to talk.

Asked about the birds, John Paul replied, “The power of speech is God’s precious gift to man alone. The mynah is just a dumb bird.” But when asked if the ban then also applied to parrots, the pontiff snapped, “Of course not! Those birds are incredible They talk better than most people!”

Chastened by the papal outburst, no one dared ask about parakeets. But an inside source at the Vatican said that budgies would be exempt from the ban because, “In the first place, they aren’t mynahs, are they?! And in the second place, those crummy little birds are so hard to understand nobody cares.” The penance for mynah bird training will be fifteen Hail Marys and the ritual sacrifice by fire of the offending feathered vocalist.

…read the rest of the column…

I do not like tagging people so if you’d like to participate, consider yourself tagged.