The bad pope

Of course, before the bad pope can preach his fire and brimstone to the cardinals, he needs a getting-ready montage — because the pope is a man and, like all of us, nothing gets you more pumped up for a big event than donning your sharpest ensemble and getting your strut on to funky pop music. This pope is sexy and he knows it, courtesy of LMFAO. It’s a humorous scene — because seriously, what is that papal tiara? It’s like the world’s most terrifying Easter egg — which lies in sharp contrast to the speech Pius is about to give to his minions. "What I want is absolute love and total devotion to God. Should that mean a church only for the few? That's a hypothesis and a hypothesis isn't the same as a reality," says Pope Pius to the cardinals. "But even this hypothesis isn't so scandalous. I say better to have a few that are reliable than to have a great many that are distractible but indifferent." It's not hard to draw the parallel between Lenny's anger toward his parents and his attitude toward God. After being abandoned, Lenny turned to God, who was, as Lenny says, "a God who never leaves me and who always leaves me." Lenny's relationship with God is obviously complicated, but he wants human beings to revere God as they would their own parents (or their own children). The same speech could be applied to families everywhere — wouldn't it better to have fewer but reliable parents than to have parents who are indifferent? The famous Elie Wiesel quote says that the opposite of love isn't hate, it's indifference, which could not be more true in Lenny's case. So in lieu of having a healthy, functional relationship with either his parents or his God, Lenny has decided Pius takes a hard line on faith ... and then insists all of his cardinals come kiss his actual slipper. "I know you will obey because you've already figured out that this pope isn't afraid to lose the faithful if they've been even slightly unfaithful and that means this pope does not negotiate -- on anything and with anyone. And this pope cannot be blackmailed," Pius tells his clergy, a pointed reminder to Cardinal Voiello (Silvio Orlando). Earlier, Lenny sussed out all of Voiello's plans and either sincerely, or as a ploy, convinced Voiello that he is a righteous man, a saint even. It caused Voiello to break down in tears, begging for forgiveness in a scene that was exquisitely shot from so low to the ground that Pius positively towered over the cowering Voiello. So it would seem that the pope's main opposition has been thwarted — but we're only halfway through the season. So what else will be springing up for him to fight against? Because surely we aren't going to spend the next five episodes watching the pope make his cardinals and flock do radical and possibly demeaning things in the name of God. Perhaps the foe will come in the form of Tonino Pettola (Franco Pinelli), the shepherd who claims to have healing powers and the stigmata on is hands. At episode's end, Pius and his cohorts visited Tonino's home to do something about the outspoken shepherd "busting [their] balls." This comes on the heels of a brief mention of a possible miracle Lenny performed as a boy, healing a terminally ill woman at the orphanage. We definitely want to hear more about that, so hopefully as the action shifts to Tonino we'll dig into Lenny's sainthood a little more. And perhaps with Pius' hard line on devotion and faith, Tonino will become a rallying point for people who think religion should be easier and more fun than Pius' description of "hard work" where sin is "no longer forgive at will."