National Geographic

Once upon a time, Joseph Ratzinger had an organ donor card. But now that's he's the pope, his organs are too holy to transplant.

In 1999, six years before he was elected to the papacy, then Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger disclosed that he always carried an organ donor's card with him and encouraged the practice as "an act of love." Vatican officials say that after a pope dies, his body belongs to the entire Church and must be buried intact. Furthermore, if papal organs were donated, they would become relics in other bodies if he were eventually made a saint.

Emperor Palpatine yesterday issued yet another attack on same-sex marriage, saying that the effort to legalize gay unions "perverts" the meaning of the word "family."

Addressing officials from the city of Rome and the Italian region of Lazio, Pope Benedict said that legislation and policies that promote same-sex unions end up “penalizing” heterosexual couples, “who, not without effort, seek to maintain stable emotional ties which are juridically guaranteed and publicly recognized.” “To this end,” he stressed, “the various components of society must agree on the objectives of education, in order for human love not to be reduced to an article of consumption, but to be seen and lived as a fundamental experience which gives existence meaning and a goal.”

Ill Papa made his comments in a traditional exchange of New Year messages with the mayor of Rome.

Emperor Palpatine has waived the traditional five year post-death waiting period and is moving to have Pope John Paul II named a saint. Because he was a miracle worker. Literally.

The pope on Friday signed off on the miracle needed to beatify Pope John Paul II, and set May 1 as the date to honor one of the most beloved popes of all times as a model of saintliness for the church. Pope Benedict XVI said in a decree that a French nun's recovery from Parkinson's disease was miraculous, the last step needed for beatification. A second miracle is needed for the Polish-born John Paul to be made a saint. The May 1 ceremony, which Benedict himself will celebrate, is expected to draw hundreds of thousands of pilgrims to Rome — a major morale boost for a church reeling from a wave of violence against Christians and fallout from the clerical sex abuse scandal.

Victims of abuse at the hands of Catholic clergy are denouncing the beatification, noting that thousands of incidents of child molestation were covered up by Catholic authorities during John Paul's reign.