Crowds flock to the miracle chair of Porto

A warehouse assistant has made possibly the most important religious discovery since the Dead Sea scrolls were pulled from a skip in 1947.

When new Chelsea Czar Jose Mourinho's old office furniture was put up for auction this week at Estevez's auctioneers in Porto, employee João Rodrigues Lopes noticed what he thought was a stain on the back of the Emperor of Stamford Bridge's favourite blue chair.

Despite the best efforts of the city's top cleaners — who spent two hours unsuccessfully trying to remove the blemish using a mixture of special commercial solvents and new fizzing ultrabrite Persil 2004 with added protenzymic prewash and alpine meadowfresh conditioner — it stubbornly refused to shift. The effect of the scrubbing did, however, allow Rodrigues a closer look at the mysterious markings. What he saw amazed him.

"After the chair was cleaned, all the other dirt surrounding the stain had been removed but the original pattern was even more apparent," said Rodrigues. "It was then that I clearly saw the face of our Lord Jesus Christ staring back at me from the backrest."

A crowd quickly gathered around the divine apparition. "It was as if they were drawn to it," stammered a visibly-epiphanised Rodrigues.

Lisbon lorry driver Pedro Vieira — who had been taking a light lunch of a salted codfish and vintage Port in the transport café next door — was the first to make the pilgrimage: "There was no doubt about it. That was the face of Christ right there on that chair. Even though I am a Benfica supporter by birth, I always new there was something special about that Jose Mourinho," he said, vigorously crossing himself as he uttered Mourinho's name.

Experts in religious artefacts and modern office furniture from all around the world quickly descended on the small industrial area of Porto to try and establish the origins of the manifestation.

Julian Cater, a representative of Staples office furniture told The Rockall Times: "This is an incredible discovery. To my knowledge, a vinyl seat of this nature has never previously been soiled to a point that it couldn't be satisfactorily cleaned. Everybody in the industry is talking about it and I'm just so excited to be here to witness the moment for myself."

The Mourinho Chair was later moved to a more secure location after several cripples — who had travelled to Porto in the hope of being restored to full mobility by sitting in the Chair — were trampled to death as a mob of hysterical Catholics attempted to rush the warehouse. It is currently under lock and key at Porto's Natural History Museum where it is being tested using sophisticated image processing based on direct and inverse Fourier transform, enhancement and template-matching techniques to determine its authenticity.

If the tests prove that the mark is not manmade, the price of the Mourinho Chair is expected to rocket from the €25 reserve that had been placed on it.

A spokesman for the Vatican said: "The papal curia held an emergency meeting last night. It was decided that if this is indeed the face of Christ and not a careless coffee stain then we must have it at all costs." The Pope ordered that four "special envoys" from the Sicilian church of St Corleone be sent to Porto immediately. His Holiness is being kept apprised of developments via satellite uplink to his high-tech Vatican command centre.

Jose Mourinho — currently on a pre-season tour with Chelsea to subdue an uprising of the tribes along the Danube — seemed unimpressed with the news. "This is of no surprise to me," he confirmed while handing out fish paste sandwiches to his squad of 311 players and picking out one in ten of the team for summary execution.

Previously

• Chelsea's Mourinho lays down the law