Vatican football team proposed: Holy Smoke!

Sister Mary: “Jeez, if I can’t be a priest, the least they
could do would be to offer me a position as Coach”.

In Football We Trust. And in clear reference to soccer, St Paul preached: “If God is for us, who can be against us?”. Pope Benedict’s second-in-command, Cardinal Bertone, is an enthusiastic football fan who yearns to put a Vatican United team into the Italian Football Federation (IFF). He said “We would succeed on a winger and a prayer, because there are plenty of Brazillian trainee priests studying in Catholic Universities. They all need an outlet [uh-oh! Ed.]

The Vatican United Football Club has an infallible pedigree: Pope John Paul II was a competent Goalie in his youth. However, the current pope Benedict XVI is lagging a bit. Some years ago, when introduced to Pele at the Vatican, he enquired: “So you’re Brazilian?”. Cardinal Bertone plans, however, to launch the yellow & white God-Squad, complete with cruciform-shaped spriggs on their boots, as his very first Papal Edict after he is elected as the next pope. “The church can’t be hurried in its decisions,” he remarked. [Not wrong. Ed.]

As a pre-emptive political gesture, Benedict presented some of his priests’ children with a pre-blessed Papal football, but suggested afterwards that they would suffer for years in Limbo if they ever sold it on Ebay.

Finding space for a V.U.F.C. stadium would be a problem, he admitted, as the Vatican comprises less than half a square kilometre. However, FunkyPix2’s sports editor notes that the forecourt of the Vatican [see below] would have plenty of space if that tall skinny pillar housing an old splinter of wood were re-located and converted into a flood-light tower and/or commentary box. The forecourt area is already surroundrd by a stone-pillar grandstand with giant statues of fans. These statues could be adorned with scarves in the colours of all the clubs in the IFF.

Another holy goal for Vatican United Under Eights.
Football's salvation is assured.

A less viable alternative would be to use the Vatican’s dome as a stadium roof. It is just wide enough to fit a football pitch inside using a suspended ceiling, but there wouldn’t be any seating space left over for the congregation of spectators.

Sports fans are agreed that when VUFC finally enters the football world, blasphemy during games would become a thing of the past. “They’ll be days of wine and Moses”, quipped the cardinal gaily. I bags being commentator. I shall endeavour to love mine enemy team as myself". [uh-oh. Ed.]

*and in BREAKING NEWS...

FunkyPix2 is encouraging the Vatican to field a Women's Basketball team and is providing advice on the proposed style of the outfits.
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