The Pope is getting his own weekly fanzine! We’re not talking some stodgy relic to buy at the Vatican gift shoppe to prove you were there, oh no! This is something that’s going to be coming out every week on newssstands all across Italy, and being produced by a regular capitalist magazine publisher, not an official Vatican source. This presumably means that somebody has market research to suggest the Italian marketplace has enough demand for Pope Junk that they’ll keep paying for pages and pages of it, week after week after week, or the publisher wouldn’t be bothering.
The 68-page Il Mio Papa (My Pope) will hit Italian newsstands on Ash Wednesday, offering a glossy medley of papal pronouncements and photographs, along with peeks into his personal life. Each weekly issue will also include a pullout centerfold of the pope, accompanied by a quote.
source: New York Times
One thing that could cut into their profits: apparently the Holy See owns the rights not only to the Pope’s writings, but also his “figure and personal identity.” Says Rev. Giuseppe Costa, director of the Libreria Editrice Vaticana, which administers the copyright, “In the case they publish the pope’s words, I will have to intervene.”
Religion as commodity much?
I will lead it to the loyal commentariat to make the jokes involving the words “Pope”, “Centrefold”, and “Junk”.
Hat tip to Melissa McEwan, Shakesville
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