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Supreme Pontiff flops at Reading

Pope John Paul II has joined Scandinavian rockers The Rasmus and heavily-perforated US rap star 50 Cent in being booed off stage at the Reading Festival. The 92-year-old Catholic supremo and his band, The Church, managed only two numbers before the barrage of bottles, mud and small coins forced them to abandon their performance.

Shaking with emotion at a backstage press conference His Holiness denounced the crowd as a bunch of shi*t-for-brains indiekid fuc*kwits in seven European languages and a form of hip-hop patois common in the New Orleans rap scene. None of the little bastards in the crowd would make it to Heaven, he went on, because as the world's leading authority he could clearly see they had no soul.

The Pope's European tour has been dogged by controversy and public relations disasters, including a pitched battle between Slipknot fans and the Swiss Guard at the Molde Festival in Norway, the arrest of percussionist Cardinal Hernan de la Vega in the grounds of a Romanian orphanage and the dismissal of the Carmelite sisters who provided backing vocals after the Holy Father's entourage had shared a hotel with the Newcastle United squad.

Many Vatican watchers believe this new initiative to bring the Word to the young people of the world has backfired and may cost the Papacy dear. The lavish sets, designed by Bernini and Michelangelo, are rumoured to have cost upwards of thirteen billion dollars and are carried between venues in 23 articulated lorries drawn by elephants. With ticket prices for the tour set at a democratic three dollars, the Vatican coffers are emptying at an alarming rate.

More alarming still for the Office of Doctrine is the damage done to the dogma of Papal Infallibility. After rehearsals of the new show the Holy Father issued an encyclical in which he declared that JP2 & The Church "like, so totally fuc*kin' rocked". The critical and public response, however, suggests that the Pope has got this one wrong. T-shirt vendor Andrew Hopwood said that his biggest selling line over the weekend bore the slogan "FUC*K OFF BACK TO ....." with a choice of Helsinki, Queens or Rome.

The Rasmus and JP2 & The Church headline the Rockall Festival at the end of January. Tickets are still available.

Previously

• BBC Pope exposé stuns world
• Pope calls for return to core Catholic values
• I have never been a Catholic, claims Pope

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