Vatican Attempts Return to Dark Ages:

The latest from Rome is the Vatican's plans to make stem cell research a hell-bound offense. Scientists who are involved in embryonic stem cell research (potentially the most important health related field in human history) will be automatically excommunicated, with no direct action on the part of the Catholic church itself.

Spokesmen from the Roman See did not clarify how this might affect Buddhist, Hindu, Jewish, Protestant, or atheist researchers. Some skeptics asked if this were simply another attempt to defray attention from the church's practice of simply slapping the hands of priests who are caught sexually abusing children. The spokesmen had no comment, other than to note the church's long standing belief in the sanctity of human suffering.

It is, in the church's view, quite okay to destroy human embryos as long as it's not done for the sake of alleviating human suffering. Currently, thousands are destroyed routinely without any sort of papal impunity. Fundamentalists, who a few years ago considered the Pope the Antichrist, cheered.

Next up: Billions to be donated to the discovery of the exact number of angels to dance on the head of a pin.