Tut.

so we pay for his visit and now he gets off paying this! why is her here, its beyond me. they are a nasty bigoted lot at the vatican with double standardsyet he is being treated like the 2nd coming.love to know what God thinks of him and his hangers on.

Has anyone frisked him and checked under his mitre to make sure he hasn't nicked the raspberries from Jononono's allotment?

The only way I can not get riled up about it is to pretend it is like a pop star visiting. He has his fans and they are happy. Who am I to scoff at that?

A few songs he might sing:

Highway to Hell 
Like a prayer
Heaven is a place on earth

"Jesus thinks you're a  jerk!" One of my faves usually used against the USA right wing evangelist/tea party bunch!

I want to know whether he performed a Beet Defecation ceremony for her.

Why doesn't this surprise me...

Five held in London in pope terror alert

Gary Glitter medley seems more likely. 

I mistook the popemobile for an ice cream van today...I only realised my mistake when I read 'Wouldn't mind that child' on the back.

Batman still has the better wheels 

lol  @  Croc 

I keep misreading the papal visit as the paypal visit.

Day Tripper

The person to blame for this over blown circus is the idiot who made the invitation.
Now who would that be?

And they should pick up the tab for costs, not the tax payer (which includes many tax paying atheists).

I don't think people are too bothered about the cost, it's peanuts-probably what Wayne Rooney earns in a season or less. It's more to do with the backward philosophy he brings with him.

People are bothered by the cost, it's estimated to come in at over £12M and that is a sizable amount of money to the vast majority of people in this country. I don't see the comparison with Wayne Rooney, you are comparing apples and oranges there. Wayne Rooney's wages is based on the ability of the business (which is Manchester United) to pay them. Individuals make the decision to watch Wayne Rooney's team. If they did not then he would not be paid the sums he is.

I work in a business which will lose that sum of money and more due to government cuts. The inevitable consequence is redundancies. That money would ensure jobs for many years to come.

Look at it another way. NICE keep saying that certain drugs are too expensive to fund. £12M would certainly help fund some patients in need of those drugs.

I will agree with the point that this man and his kind have some very outdated ideas which are in dire need of reformation.

I would like to report that I GOT MY WOOD!!! I now have some raised beds half built. I have had to do sawing and everything and I only have little arms, which are now tired little arms.


Actually it was pretty easy driving around, everyone else must have stayed at home. I left the allotment once 'Pope in the Park' was underway and I got home in 15 minutes even through the diversion. Yay for the pope!

Completely and utterly well said. I DO resent my taxes paying for this archaic individual and his circus of sycophants when my local council is closing day centres which the elderly and people with severe disabilities rely on. When a dear friend of mine who is dying has to beg for drugs to keep her alive from her local PCT.
Yes I do resent it - and now I am all cross again. 

I hope you're all going to be this vocal the next time there's a state visit. I agree with the hypocracy, the doubt, the crap that comes out of the Vatican, but this is an invited Head of State, just like the others. I don't recall this backlash when the Chinese Head of State came over. Which annoys people more, the religious or the political (financial) aspect?

It's highly debatable whether Vatican City even qualifies as a state.  They only cooked it up about 80 years ago in a deal with that old rascal Mussolini.

And it's also absurd to equate state visits and funding for an equivalent visit from the boss o' China.  Whether you like it or not, we have significant trading interests with that country.  We do not with Mr Popes nasty little gaff.

To be fair, I don't think there was this much hype or fuss or pomp.

And yet it is a state, just as San Marino, the next in line for smallest, is a state.

Oooo, there's a good point.........given the way the Chinese treat their people!

Not the pomp Isa, for sure, but the fuss was even bigger by people who have felt the oppression of China.

I said it's debatable.



The Vatican has no permanent population - this is a requirement of being a state.

It has no jurisdiction over crimes committed within its borders.

It depends for all its services on Italy

And, worst of all, it does not even have a football team.


There is a body of thought that is status as a state is at the very least dubious under international law.

Fair enough, I'm not going to be the defender of the State of The Vatican. I was brought up very strictly Catholic, Kindergarden, Primary School and Boarding, all nuns and desperate vicars. I don't agree with any of it, but I defend the right of him to come here anyway.

I know he was invited by the Brown man, but why? Is it to 'galvanize' his subjects or to recruit new ones?

Maybe it's just to introduce him in 'the flesh'.   It's been a long time since the last pope visited Britain. He was a prolific traveller, this one is still under the microscope.

Me too cologne - I don't get it, I don't understand it, but others clearly do - so it's fine by me.

I don't agree with the Olympics coming here either, and all the money that will cost, but it will give great enjoyment to many - so again it's fine by me.

I'm a simple soul really

But I don't want to see him, allthough I respect that there are loads that do. I shouldn't be paying my taxes to do so, I don't think.

 

There's a lot of things I shouldn't be paying my taxes for ... but we live in a democracy

Democracy - I can't opt out of this

I think £ 5 million are paid by the Vatican themselves. I just think nobody complains about the cost Sarkosy and his wife throw up (for instance). State visits are happening all the time. This one is high profile, but probably doesn't cost anymore than any of the others.

dunno ... I never thought of doing that 

In short, I can't abide any religion or what it stands for, ok, everyone to their own but why make me and others like me have anything to do with it

You don't have anything to do with it other than seeing it on the news and you can switch that off. The fact that we are all paying towards it is no more than we do towards any State visit and we never seem to complain about that, so religion does still rile people more than anything else.