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Roger Rabbits with |
It’s a story that needs to be told. Right here, right now. Sounds like that Fatboy Slim anthem. Right here, right now…
Especially now the tumult has died, now that the smoke from the Sistine Chapel and the thuribles of the Papal installation has dissipated. Being a boring ‘Proddie’, I didn’t know how much the Catholics love their smoke.
And now that the cardinals have packed their dinky red sneakers and jazzy scarlet zucchettos and cassocks and gone back to their day jobs in the dioceses, and TV broadcast trucks have disappeared from Vatican Square.
So the time is very right to share something deeply personal and spiritual.
I know Bob Prevost. Robert Francis Prevost. You’d know him as the newly-elected Pope Leo XIV.
Well, I don’t know him personally. But I know a bloke, Mick ‘thuh Merican’ Wook, lately of Tauranga, who knows him.
Well, that’s hyperbole too. He doesn’t personally know the Pope either. But as Mick likes to explain, with respect, the Pope is his brother by a different father to a different mother.
And come Monday, September 14, Mick would not be surprised to get a papal phone call. And the chat could go like this.
Hello Mick
“Salve Mick, quid agis?” this man of many tongues would say quietly in Latin – because that’s the way it shakes down in the Vatican.
Or he might say: “Hola Mick, como estas?” from his days in Peru, or just good old: “Hello Mick, how are yuh?” from his days at home in Chi-caw-go.
Then the Pope would wish Mick a happy birthday. And Mick, in turn, would wish the Holy Father happy birthday. Because, inconceivably, the two men, Mick and the Pope, share a date of birth.
Not just a birthday, but the actual date of birth, Wednesday, September 14, 1955. They were born on the same day, of the same month, of the same year. Both are 69.
I can sense gasps of astonishment as you digest this. Holy Mother of Jesus! What a coincidence, what a story!
Mick and Pope Leo are twins – not biological, but Astro Twins, or Star Twins, as the astrologers call them. Birthday twins, Birthday Buddies.
And the probability of meeting someone with your exact birthday and age is approximately one in 36,865.
Like for like
The Tauranga connection doesn’t end there. Mick “thuh ‘Merican” Wook, says the Pope is 175.26cm tall. Mick is 175.26cm tall. Mick says the Pope weighs 92kg. A month ago, Mick weighed 92kg. Extraordinary.
The Pope’s brother is from New Lenox, a southwest suburb of Chicago. Mick’s best mate lives in New Lenox.
So the question is, why wasn’t the media clamouring to tell Mick’s story? Why weren’t the TV broadcast trucks parked up at Mick’s front door the week around the election of the new Pope? He had a real story to tell. But,
Instead, we were forced to watch parades of people basking in reflected glory, telling tenuous stories about their flimsy, far-removed connection to the new Pope.
Such as: “I drove past St Mary of the Assumption Primary school where Pope Leo was educated”. Cue breathless tones from CNN anchor. “Wow! Tell us more.”
I know if CNN had been aware of Mick’s Papal connection, it would have cancelled the Vatican pizzeria waiter who took the Pope’s pepperoni lunch order 10 years ago. That might have been newsworthy had it been a Hell pizza because Hell pizzas are called Lust, Greed, Wrath, Envy, Pride and Gluttony – sinful and not very Papal stuff.
And they wouldn’t have interviewed the Peruvian Football Club honcho, who received a non-playing membership fee from the Pope before he was the Pope. That was decidedly underwhelming. They should have spoken to Astro Twin Mick because Astro Twin Mick had a real story to tell.
A beatific smile
The coincidence doesn’t end there. Both Mick and the Pope are “dual citizens” – the Pope in United States and Peru; and Mick in the USA and New Zealand.
The Pope saw a White Sox game at the new Comiskey ballpark on Chicago’s south side. And our Mick was at the first ever White Sox game at that very same ballpark. How about that?
And here’s Mick sharing his story over a pint. I was in the presence of greatness and the blessed. And Mick was wearing this beatific smile – a look of rapture, joy and peace. Very unsettling.
He’d obviously had a moment of great realisation and revelation. Or perhaps it was the beer kicking in? On the other hand, it was sad because Mick’s story should have made wonderful ‘Breaking News’ on the world stage – and now it’s relegated to Page 2 of a poxy community rag in Tauranga. Sorry Mick.
The Pope’s brother lives in Naples, Florida. Mick’s been to Naples, Florida, several times. Well I never!
There the coincidence ends – because while the Pope is supremely Catholic, Mick’s of the secular world, pagan. But he will still dine out on his Papal connection anytime.