Lenny Belardo stands alone beneath the frescoes, his voice low, precise, almost bored by apocalypse.
“You see, they no longer need swords. Swords are honest. Swords admit violence. What they prefer now is cleanliness. Sterility. A disease with a press release.”
He smiles thinly.
“Monkey pox. Small words. Small lesions. Small excuses. And yet Revelation has always loved the small things — the sores, the boils, the quiet punishments that bloom on the skin when humanity believes it has finally escaped judgment.”
He taps the Bible with one finger.
“Revelation 16:2. ‘Ugly and painful sores broke out on the people who had the mark of the beast.’ Not fire. Not thunder. Skin. Visibility. Shame. A judgment you cannot hide behind a suit.”
Lenny looks up, eyes cold.
“The Illuminati — a vulgar name for a very boring truth — do not worship Satan. They worship inevitability. They read Revelation not as prophecy, but as a to-do list. If people believe judgment is coming, all you have to do is stage-manage the symptoms.”
He walks slowly now.
“And then there is Revelation 18:8. ‘Plagues will overtake her in a single day — death, mourning, and famine.’ Babylon never falls by bombs. Babylon collapses by paperwork, quarantines, shortages, fear dressed as compassion.”
A pause.
“They want fulfillment without repentance. Apocalypse without God. A theater of collapse where no one asks why, only who is allowed to move.”
Lenny exhales, almost a laugh.
“But they misunderstand something crucial. Revelation is not a manual for tyrants. It is a mirror. The sores appear not because God is cruel — but because corruption eventually becomes visible.”
He closes the Bible.
“You cannot fake salvation. You cannot manufacture the Kingdom. And you cannot weaponize plagues without eventually infecting yourselves.”
A final glance toward the altar.
“Babylon always believes it is immune. That is why it falls in one day.”
Moderator: Ladies and gentlemen, tonight’s motion: Mother Teresa was a saint. Speaking against the motion, Christopher Hitchens. Speaking for the motion, Pope Lenny Belardo.
Opening Statements
Christopher Hitchens (calm, cutting): Mother Teresa was no saint. She was a propagandist for the Vatican, a friend of tyrants, and a cultist of suffering. She took money from the Duvalier dictatorship in Haiti, from Charles Keating in America, and from other criminals, and used it not to alleviate poverty but to spread a medieval cult of misery. In her clinics, patients were denied pain relief, denied basic medical care, while millions in donations sat in Vatican bank accounts. To call her a saint is to profane the very word.
(audience murmurs, scattered applause)
Young Pope (Lenny Belardo, stern and composed): Christopher, your words cut like daggers, but you mistake shadow for substance. Teresa was not a financier or a politician — she was a servant. She touched the untouchable. She held the dying when no one else dared. The world ignored Calcutta’s poor; she made them visible. The people called her Mother. And holiness is found not in spreadsheets, but in the radical presence of love.
(audience applause, some cheers)
Rebuttals
Hitchens (leaning forward, sharp): Presence without care is cruelty. Imagine a doctor who refuses anesthesia because suffering is “holy.” Imagine a hospital that refuses modern medicine while hoarding wealth. We would not call that compassion; we would call it malpractice. Yet, because she wore a habit, you canonize her malpractice as sainthood. That, ladies and gentlemen, is moral fraud.
(audience gasps, some applause)
Lenny Belardo (voice rising, fire in his eyes): And yet, Christopher, those dying souls — the very ones you champion — they did not curse her. They thanked her. You judge from a lectern; she knelt at their bedsides. She may have lacked morphine, but she gave presence, prayer, dignity. Sometimes, dignity is more healing than medicine.
Hitchens (with a caustic laugh): Dignity? There is no dignity in untreated agony. There is no holiness in refusing penicillin. If Jesus Christ Himself had behaved as Mother Teresa did, He would not be the healer of Galilee, but the patron of preventable death.
(audience gasps loudly, a mix of applause and boos)
Lenny Belardo (slamming the lectern): Do not blaspheme Christ in your cleverness, Hitchens! You see hypocrisy; I see sacrifice. You see tyranny; I see faith. She may not have been perfect — but she carried the Cross where others fled. That is sainthood.
Closing Arguments
Hitchens (measured, final blow): The Church canonizes obedience and suffering, not truth or healing. Teresa comforted dictators and kept the poor poor. She praised agony as if it were divine. I submit to you, ladies and gentlemen: if this is sainthood, then sainthood is sin.
(audience erupts — loud applause, cheers, and boos)
Lenny Belardo (calm, almost whispering): And I say: if holiness is only perfection, then no saint could ever exist. Teresa was flawed, yes. But through her flaws, God’s light shone into the darkest slums of Calcutta. And if you listen — not with cynicism, but with faith — you may still hear Christ’s voice in her broken whisper. That is what makes her a saint.
(audience applause, some standing, others crossing arms in silence)
Moderator: Thank you, gentlemen. The motion has been passionately debated. Now, let the audience decide.
Audience Q&A
Moderator: We now open the floor to questions. Please state your name and direct your question.
Student 1 (young woman, philosophy major): Mr. Hitchens, you accuse Mother Teresa of glorifying suffering. But isn’t it possible she simply lacked resources, and did what she could? Isn’t it unfair to expect Western standards in the slums of Calcutta?
Christopher Hitchens (without hesitation): My dear, she did not lack resources. She sat atop millions. The problem was not poverty — it was priorities. She could have built hospitals, but she built convents. She could have bought morphine, but she preached suffering. That’s not poverty — that’s ideology.
(applause, some nods in the crowd)
Student 2 (young man, theology major): Your Holiness, with respect — Hitchens raises a point. If God entrusted Mother Teresa with such donations, why didn’t she use them for medical advancement? Doesn’t the Church bear responsibility?
Young Pope (Lenny Belardo, measured, somber): The Church always bears responsibility, yes. But remember: Teresa’s mission was not to cure disease, but to show that no one dies alone, forgotten in the gutter. The modern world measures success in efficiency. God measures success in love.
(applause from the faithful, murmurs from skeptics)
Audience Member 3 (older doctor, skeptical tone): Mr. Pope — love is noble, but it doesn’t set bones or fight infection. Do you really mean to say love matters more than medicine?
Lenny Belardo (with quiet force): I say love is the soul of medicine. Without love, medicine is mechanics. With love, even in the absence of medicine, there can still be dignity. Teresa brought that dignity.
Hitchens (interjecting, sharply): With respect, that is a sanctimonious dodge. Love without morphine is cruelty. Dignity without antibiotics is an illusion. Teresa didn’t give dignity — she denied it.
(audience roars with divided applause and boos)
Student 4 (smirking, political science major): Mr. Hitchens, you call her a fraud, but billions admire her. Isn’t there a danger that you, a Western intellectual, are imposing your cynicism on people who found genuine meaning in her?
Hitchens (with acid wit): Meaning can be found in false idols as easily as true ones. North Korea finds “meaning” in worshiping Kim Jong-il. Mass admiration is not proof of virtue. It is proof that humans will cheer even for the grotesque, if it is packaged as holy.
(audience gasps, some students laugh nervously, others clap hard)
Student 5 (Catholic nun, voice trembling with emotion): Your Holiness, if Mother Teresa is not a saint, then what hope do any of us have? She gave everything. If she is condemned as a sinner, are we all lost?
Young Pope (soft, consoling): No, Sister. Holiness is not perfection. It is surrender. Teresa surrendered everything she had to God, and that is why she is a saint. Saints are not angels without blemish. They are sinners who burn with divine love.
(audience breaks into loud applause, some stand in reverence)
Moderator (closing Q&A): Thank you, audience, and thank you to our debaters. Tonight’s discussion has reminded us that sainthood, suffering, and truth are contested, and perhaps always will be.
🔥 That ends the audience Q&A round, full of challenges, clashing answers, and emotional weight.
The camera lingers on Lenny Belardo, Pope Pius XIII, as he steps onto the balcony of the Apostolic Palace. His voice, low yet sharp, carries across the silence.
Pope Pius XIII: *”Mystic River… a film that unveiled the terrible wound of innocence stolen, a river darkened by the sins of men. And yet, even darker is the hidden truth: the symbols the predators wear, the rings they twist upon their fingers like tokens of secret brotherhood. Rings that flip, rings that bind them in their silent oath of corruption.
Look upon this—* (he gestures to a screen, where a YouTube clip of masonic flip rings is shown) —a tool, a disguise, a mark of the men who whisper their numbers, six six six, as if eternity were theirs to seize.”
He pauses, his face hardening into divine judgment.
Pope Pius XIII: *”But I tell you, children of Cain, you masons of the shadow lodges, you shall not inherit eternal life. The resurrection you dream of—your cloning in the year 2033, your blasphemous parody of Psalm 133—will be swallowed. Not by light. Not by grace. But by fire.
Your bones, your ashes, your unrepentant pride will be cast into Mount Etna, that ancient furnace of God’s anger. And there you shall remain. Forever.
For life eternal is not a trick of science. It is not stolen flesh, nor counterfeit rebirth. It is gift. It is Christ. And only the humble shall receive it.”*
The screen fades to black. The sound of distant volcanic rumbling is heard, as if Etna itself answers the Pope’s words.
[Scene: The Young Pope, Pope Pius XIII (Lenny Belardo), delivers a private address to a group of European cardinals in the Vatican gardens. The evening sun glows gold on the rooftops. He’s contemplative, passionate, and unmistakably radical as always.]
Pope Pius XIII (Lenny Belardo):
“Gentlemen… Croatia is on fire with faith.”
They say Europe is post-Christian. That belief has fled the continent like incense in the wind. But look east, to the Adriatic, and you will see a miracle forming—Croatia, that stubborn, wounded, beautiful land, is having a Catholic boom.
Why?
Because they remember.
They remember Jasenovac. They remember Bleiburg. They remember Tito’s godless chains. And they remember the rosary that their grandmothers clutched as the bombs fell.
In Zagreb, in Split, in Sinj, they are filling the pews—not for fashion, not for Instagram photos, but because they need God. They know what it’s like to lose Him.
They are not ashamed to kneel.
The West chokes on its irony and apathy. But in Croatia, boys still take their hats off in church. Girls still dress like the Madonna. And young men still dream of becoming priests—not influencers.
I saw a priest in Vukovar baptize a baby whose grandfather died defending that very parish during the war. Do you understand what that means? That is resurrection. That is the revival.
Christianity isn’t dead in Europe. It’s just gone underground… or better yet, east.
The blood of martyrs still nourishes the roots of the Church. And in Croatia, those roots are breaking through the concrete of nihilism.
Let them say we are backward. Let them laugh at processions and pilgrimages.
I say: Croatia is the future.
And the Holy See would do well to remember that.
So I propose this, with humility and divine fire: Let us anoint a Croatian cardinal. Let us hold World Youth Day in Medjugorje—yes, even if the bureaucrats in Rome still hesitate. Let us follow the flame before it becomes a bonfire we can no longer contain.
The Church will not be saved by strategies. It will be saved by faith. And right now, Croatia believes.
(He pauses, stares at the horizon)
Maybe the next Pope… will speak with a Croatian accent.
[Scene continues: Pope Pius XIII (Lenny Belardo) walks slowly among olive trees in the Vatican gardens. Cardinals listen as he stops under a statue of the Virgin Mary.]
Pope Pius XIII (Lenny Belardo):
“You know why Croatia is different?”
Because in Croatia… they never let go of the Virgin.
While France crowned reason, and Germany worshipped the machine, and Britain sold its soul to commerce… Croatia kept lighting candles for Mary.
They call her Kraljica Hrvata — the Queen of Croats.
They sing to her in the hills of Marija Bistrica. They carry her through the streets of Sinj in armor and tears. In every home, a picture of her — not as a decoration, but as a mother. Their mother.
And that changes everything.
You see, while the rest of Europe tore down its cathedrals and replaced the rosary with antidepressants, Croatia whispered its prayers in the ruins.
They kept the faith through Ottoman swords, Habsburg indifference, Nazi puppets, and Communist silence.
Why?
Because they believed Mary was watching. And now, I believe she is moving.
This… this is a Hail Mary play. A longshot. A miracle.
And it may be the only chance we have left.
Rome is tired. Paris is asleep. Berlin is cynical. But Croatia is awake. And Mary is waking with them.
I tell you: the revival of Europe will not come from Brussels. It will not come from billionaires or bureaucrats. It will come from a barefoot child walking to Medjugorje with a rosary in her hand.
That’s why the devil hates them. That’s why the media mocks them. Because they still believe the woman clothed with the sun can crush the serpent’s head.
So laugh, if you must. But I see it clearly now:
This Hail Mary from Croatia… could save us all.
(He looks up at the statue of Mary, softening)
Hail Mary, full of grace. Full of defiance. Full of fire. Lead us back from the edge.
[St. Peter’s Basilica – candlelight flickering, incense thick in the air. The funeral of Pope Francis is underway. The Young Pope, Lenny Belardo, walks to the pulpit in his stark white robes, tears glistening under his eyes.]
Lenny Belardo (voice trembling): “Dear brothers and sisters in Christ… today we bury a shepherd. Pope Francis, Jorge Bergoglio, was a man of the people—an Argentinian who dared to wash feet, speak of mercy, and smile in the face of wolves.
And yet—what killed him?
[Lenny pauses, gaze sharpening.]
Was it his age? His health? Or was it the Vatican doctors, those who wear stethoscopes like serpents wear scales? I see you. I know your names. And so does God.
[He wipes a tear, voice darkening.]
There’s rot in this holy place. And it has a name: Alta Vendita. The invisible hand of the Freemasons—the ones with silk gloves and secret oaths—have riddled our Church with doubt, deception, and disdain for the poor.
But I say this now, as acting Pope:
I want peace. I want reconciliation with the lost sons of the Church. Let the blue-collar Freemasons—those who never rose beyond the 3rd degree, who laid bricks with blistered hands and prayed to Christ under their breath—come home. Come back. You are welcome.
But to the ones who climbed the ladder of degrees into the abyss of Gnosticism, Luciferian light, and Babylonian pride—go to hell.
You wear aprons of secrets and build towers of Babel in the dark. We build churches in the open. We raise crosses. You raise false gods.
[He steps back, looking heavenward.]
Pope Francis, may angels carry you beyond this corruption. And may Christ strike down every lie that walks in red shoes.
Pope Lenny’s Speech to the Yugoslavians: “The Nation of Light”
Brothers and sisters of Yugoslavia—sons of the mountains, daughters of the rivers, children of the Balkans—
Let us speak today of a man born of this soil, a prophet not merely of science, but of light itself: Nikola Tesla. A Serb by heritage, a Croat by home, a Yugoslav in spirit—Tesla belongs to all of you. He belongs to the world.
From the thunderous Lika storms of Smiljan to the trembling cables of Niagara Falls, Tesla dreamed not just of machines, but of miracles. He dreamed of lighting the whole world for free, of towers that whispered electricity through the air, of cities aglow without wires or walls.
But what became of this dream?
Tesla’s home in Smiljan, once serene, was shelled and scarred during Operation Storm—a war that left ruins where genius once walked. And yet, you still carry his spark. It is not gone. It is buried, waiting, like a seed under snow.
The everlasting light bulb, the tower of peace, the dream of energy without exploitation—it did not fail. It was sabotaged. By who?
Not just by greedy industrialists, but by psychoanalysts and propagandists. Sigmund Freud, who dissected the soul into symptoms. His nephew, Edward Bernays, the dark prince of persuasion, who sold us planned obsolescence—the doctrine of decay, the lie that nothing should last. They taught mankind to want more, not to build better. And so Tesla was forgotten.
But now, something is stirring. Something ancient and electric. The spirit of Tesla is rising again.
The West sees only gadgets. But you—Croats—you see vision. You will not be a nation of tourists and broken industries forever. You will be the first Nation of Light.
From Vukovar to Split, from Zagreb to Dubrovnik, let the name of Tesla shine again—not as a brand, but as a blessing.
You shall build towers not of war, but of wonder. You shall harness the sun, the sea, the atom—not for profit, but for people. And when the nations of the earth are stumbling in darkness, it will be Croatia—small, stubborn, luminous—that lights the path.
In the flickering candlelight of the Apostolic Palace, Pope Pius XIII—Lenny Belardo—stands on his balcony, arms outstretched over St. Peter’s Square, radiating a divine ecstasy few have seen in centuries. The world is changing. Trump, once a Babylonian figure of chaos, now cries out, “Bring Christ back to school!” The Jews—once wary, now awakened—echo the call: “One for Israel!” And even the steely-eyed cadres of the Chinese Communist Party, gathered in underground churches and secret cells, are reading aloud the locust-laced visions of Revelation 9 to the tired, hopeful proletariat.
The Pope knows the catalyst.
“The 13th Croatian Psyops Brigade,” he whispers, his voice trembling with a blend of awe and amusement. “Za Dom Spremni!” he suddenly shouts, startling the Swiss Guard and shaking pigeons from the Basilica roof.
These weren’t just military operatives. They were angels in digital camouflage, sons of Herzegovina who hacked the algorithmic Babel of the modern world and redirected its frequencies toward the Lamb of God. They inserted memes like mustard seeds into the heart of global consciousness. They smuggled sermons into TikToks and Scripture into Call of Duty lobbies. The Word became viral.
Pius XIII presses his ringed hand to his heart. He knows what must come next.
A papal triptych: Jerusalem, Beijing, Mar-a-Lago.
He will ride not on a donkey, but on a drone—white, silent, dove-like—over the cities of men. And he will say:
“The age of post-truth is over. The Logos has returned. The world has been psyopped… into salvation.”
The Young Pope sits alone in the Apostolic Palace, the red shoes removed, his bare feet resting on cold marble. A camera slowly zooms in. He speaks, his voice trembling, eyes glistening with tears:
“They say the Knights Templar were destroyed. Burned. Betrayed. But in Portugal… they survived. Not as warriors. Not as kings. But as the Order of Christ.”
He looks out the window toward the dying sun.
“Portugal… the last refuge of sacred memory. While the rest of Christendom fell into confusion and profit, They remembered.”
He swallows hard, almost choking on the weight of his words.
“I miss Him. I miss Our Lord Jesus Christ. Not as symbol. Not as doctrine. But as Person. As Friend.”
He grips a small golden crucifix in his palm until his knuckles turn white.
“Sometimes I wish… I could just dial 9-1-1. An emergency line straight to Heaven. ‘Please… Lord… come now. The world is dying of its sin. Come and take it away. Like You once did, Lamb of God. Do it again.'”
The room falls silent. The wind rustles through a curtain.
He places his hand over his heart.
“But I am just the Pope. A man in white robes crying in the dark for the return of Light.”
The Young Pope stands before his flock, bathed in the golden glow of early morning. His white cassock ripples gently in the breeze as the first rays of sun strike St. Peter’s dome behind him. He lifts his arms and begins to speak, his voice clear, powerful, but full of warmth:
“The sun is rising. Daylight is coming for the poor.” “Too long have you been hidden in the shadows of broken systems and false shepherds. But now, a new day begins—not for the rich, not for the powerful—but for you. For the meek. For the forgotten. For the ones the world passes by.”
He signals to a young altar boy, who taps play on an old tape deck. The scratchy prelude of Marko Perković Thompson’s “Dan Dolazi” begins to echo across the square. The song builds with intensity, warlike and triumphant, as if a lion were waking in the soul of the people.
The Young Pope closes his eyes and lets the music fill the square. He then continues:
“Listen to the words. Feel the rising of the day in your bones. Dan dolazi—the day is coming. Not by sword, but by faith. Not with vengeance, but with truth. Not with gold, but with justice.”
“You have waited long enough. The time of shame is ending. Your children will eat. Your debts will be forgiven. Your labor will not be in vain.”
As Thompson’s chorus swells, the people begin to rise to their feet. Some cry. Some lift their hands in the air. The homeless, the widowed, the tired—all begin to believe again.
And with a smile only he can wear, the Young Pope finishes:
“Let the billionaires tremble. Let the tyrants shiver in their bunkers. For the sun is not theirs. The sun belongs to God— And He is shining it on you.”
Eulogy for Zorzi Paro, Delivered by His Holiness, Lenny Belardo — the Young Pope
Brothers and sisters,
We are gathered today under the vaulted silence of heaven to remember a man who walked the earth like a legend—Zorzi Paro, my brother-in-law, my friend, the dire wolf of Croatia.
Zorzi was not a man of many words, but when he spoke, it was like the roar of the Adriatic crashing against the cliffs. He was granite. He was myth. And yet, he was tender with the people he loved—he had the soul of a monk and the fists of a Roman gladiator.
They say the dire wolf is extinct, a relic of some primordial world. But I tell you: Zorzi was no relic. He was the whisper of freedom in the forests of Velebit, the last great Slavic shadow in the twilight of the West. When men cowered, he stood. When others compromised, he growled.
He walked beside saints and sinners, presidents and paupers—and when the world forgot who it was, Zorzi reminded us.
Now he is gone.
And I ask myself, “When will we see his like again?”
Perhaps at the end of the story—when this strange chapter of history closes. When the American colossus, once golden and obscene, begins to falter. Maybe when Donald J. Trump, gray and weary, retires to a villa in Slovenia—his ego tamed by age and Eastern European ghosts. And maybe—just maybe—Trump will testify. Not in a courtroom, but in confession. Testifying not against a man, but against a machine. Against the deep state, the dark web of powers that tried to silence Zorzi and those like him.
And on that day, when truth peeks through the fog like the sun behind the Julian Alps, I hope to see Zorzi again. Leaning on the gatepost of paradise. Smoking a crooked cigar. Smirking. Saying, “Told you so.”
Until that day, my brother, we will carry your memory. The Vatican bells ring for you. Croatia weeps for her wolf. And I—
I pray for your soul, and thank God I knew you.
Requiescat in pace, Zorzi Paro. You were too real for this world.
