Today is the day to avoid the uncomfortable topic.

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Book By Its Cover Review: The New Pope

It's hard to get psyched for the new Pope when you're already so Pope'd out. Now that they've finally chosen one, it's like, great. Can we have a new internationally captivating topic, now?

I am neither for nor against the new Pope but as is integral to this series, I know pretty much nothing about him. His name is Joseph Ratzinger, which, I'm sorry, does not sound very Pope-like. The previous Pope's name, Karol Wojtyla, seemed mystical and old. Obviously, this was just basically because it it was Polish but Joseph Ratzinger still could at least be a little less Westernized. It could at least be Josef to us but it's not. I don't know why they didn't translate Pope John Paul's name for us but in the end, "Joseph Ratzinger" is going to sound to me like the name of a guy my dad works with or something.

Also, Ratzinger is German, which is sort of a letdown. I won't fault the Germans for the German stereotypes, but it would have been cool to have a third-world/minority pope. And yes, a German pope is still more exciting than an Italian one but it's not the same. And as Larry David says, (I am paraphrasing), it's not often you get to be affectionate with a German.

This pope is a lot older than the last pope was when he was elected, so that's sort of whatever, if I may coin a phrase. The papacy obviously hopes to recruit young people and get them excited but it can be hard when the guy in charge is obviously so far away from his youth.

On the other hand, he has hair, a lot of it, so that's kind of cool, I guess. Whatever.

As for policy, I haven't yet looked into him that much. He's the pope, what do you expect? He's not going to tell you to save yourself for prom night or anything.