Showing no reprieve for death, it's alleged that his holy smokes, the Pope, suffered an attack by Vatican officials on Thursday night. The Pontiff, in a persistant not-quite-vegetative state, was dealt a heady dose of the last rites, otherwise known as the Sacrament of Anointing. The second such time the act has been performed on his breathing and still warm body in all its 26 years at the helm of the papacy.
Quick to dismiss the rumours as a forewarning toward a death—possibly at a time sure to conflict with that of Britian's Prince Charles marriage to one of his co-conspirators, thus regaining the stranglehold on a media burst—the Church seeks to remind people of the other use of the ritual. Less in times of fear and suffering, the Roman Catholics are leaning on the healing powers of the Sacrament of Anointing, the recharging of a life as it splutters toward a dark abyss. Once known as the pep and buzz to extending a life, connotations in the past few decades have mired it's vocation as the final touch of death.
Shuffling his mortal feet toward the warm, sweet bosom of an almighty God, the Catholic figure head seems ever listless about his eternal desires. Days are seen bounding about, wired by pulleys and strings to effect a life bound in energy. Others stay a hand of cold relentless after shocks of an allergy to life sparked many years ago.
Staying the course until such time as once again the full focus of the media is no longer consumed on death as heavily as it currently is in Asia. A time wherein the faithful and disorientated pilgrims return to the flock and as they do, their leader will chance a leave. Vanishing through the lurch of church and afford, perhaps, a final rest free from the minders and their heart starters.
A patron saint of the classic bait-and-switch technique for pulling in quotas.
Written on Friday, 1 April 2005