After much sifting through memo slips and monitoring of internal emails it has been disclosed that Ratzinger was not the College of Cardinals’ first choice. That was, interestingly, Cardinal Hans Grapje.
Grapje was raised in a Catholic school in The Hague and, as a young man, aspired to become a priest, but was drafted into the Army during WWII and spent two years co-piloting B17s until his aircraft was shot down in 1943 and he lost his left arm.
Captain Grapje spent the rest of the war as a chaplain, giving spiritual aid to soldiers, both Allied and enemy.
After the war, he became a priest, serving as a missionary in Africa, piloting his own plane (in spite of his handicap) to villages across the continent. In 1997, Father Grapje was serving in Zimbabwe when an explosion in a silver mine caused a cave-in. Archbishop Grapje went down into the mine to administer last rights to those too severely injured to move.
Another shaft collapsed, and he was buried for three days, suffering multiple injuries, including the loss of his right eye. The high silver content in the mine’s air gave him purpura, a life-long condition characterized by purplish skin blotches.
Although Cardinal Grapje devoted his life to the service of God as a scholar, mentor, and holy man, church leaders felt that he should never ascend to the Papacy.
They felt that the Church would never accept a one-eyed, one-armed, flying purple Papal leader.
Thanks Mike F
I don’t know anything about religion but this is half funny because ‘Grapje’ in Dutch means ‘joke’. ROFL
Ontopic: they should’ve made him pope!
Funniest thing I’ve read all weekend…
That Mike Dude sends in some really good jokes.
Yeah, but I’m no where near as funny as Mile.
Or for that matter, Gene.
Oh, I don’t know about that Mike F. I cracked right up over this one as it leads you down the garden path and then blind-sides you with the last sentence. Good one!!
I truly love this sort of joke. One day when we have lots of time I’ll tell you the joke that totally leveled an entire table of FBI agents.
You either have to be in law enforcement or know a bit about it to get the joke, so it makes little or no sense to 90% of the people on earth.
I know where you could post it…
heh heh heh
and so I shall!
I love a clever joke too! This was very funny. Now I have the song stuck in my head! ‘One eyed, one armed flying purple Papal leader’….
I must be more tired than I thought – I actually had to read it all the way to the end.
But what I can’t stand right now is wanting to read Mike F’s joke. Please, where did you post it? Please!
Hook..
Line..
and
Sinker.
Linda,
Follow the yellow brick road!
Please, where is the yellow brick road? Please!
Bella,
my blog at live journal. See the link above.
Some very interesting people from B&P are there now. You’ll recognize them, I’m sure.
I visit your site often, Mike F. I was just being silly and doing a spin off from Linda. Your dogs are gorgeous and it looks like they have a wonderful playground.