Okay I’m a month or two late in pointing this out, but I had only heard about this on Sunday. Apparently, the new pontiff has a taste for Prada shoes, Gucci sunglasses and other more expensive vestments than the previous pope. I cannot claim to care about this. Do you mean the Catholic Church allots lavish expenditures on the papacy that could be better spent on orphanages in the Belgian Congo? For shock. Talk about 500 year old news.

A friend of mine pointed this out, but please bear in mind that this individual is of West Virginian ancestry, so he had probably heard about the Pope's new shoes in some sermon about the Antichrist, just before a snake dance and a rousing session of rolling around on the floor while speaking in tongues. I’m only bringing this up because he, another friend of ours and myself tried to one-up one another with offensive remarks about Benedict:

Me: I’m sure that stuff was donated by Gucci and Prada. You know how the Italians love giving Germans whatever they ask for?

The West Virginian: I guess two soles have priority over saving souls in Africa (a much funnier verbal pun than a written one).

The Kraut: No no no. You guys don’t understand. We need expensive shoes. When you try to snap your heels with cheap shoes, you just don’t get the proper tone.

The Kraut won.