All day the radio had been warning of this windstorm and the perils it was bringing to civilization, so amidst the sirens in the distance and falling hydro wires, it was easy enough to think that a new and apocalyptic age was being ushered in. Encouraging these feelings of dread was the fact that the grand jury announcement on the Michael Brown shooting in Ferguson, Missouri, was to be announced in just a few hours.

(Paul McCulloch, father of Robert)

In a defensive, almost combative tone, St. Louis County prosecuting attorney Robert McCulloch (His father was a police officer who was alleged to have been killed by a black suspect when McCulloch was 12-years-old) spoke for nearly 45 minutes, casting aspersions on social media, journalists and Ferguson residents in announcing that officer Darren Wilson would not be charged in the death of Michael Brown.

Nobody was surprised.

This hotly anticipated announcement took place at 9 pm, as if engineered to encourage riots and rebellious protests throughout the night, rather than minimize them. The state was well prepared, of course, and the predictable happened.

It seems that the laws are set-up very specifically to protect police officers from being charged with a crime while in the process of discharging their constabulary duties. This doesn’t feel right. If anything, those wielding power must be held accountable to a higher standard, not freed from one. It is obvious that it’s easier for somebody in power, especially institutional power, to lie and protect that lie, than it is for somebody without power to do so, and if a police officer, with the entire might and authority of his department behind him, kills a teen who does not have a gun,  firing 12 shots that hit him 7 times, then an indictment is essential, if only for the general good of a grieving and shocked community.

It’s widely believed that in America individual rights trump all, that Darren Wilson’s right to protect himself was more important than a community’s right to have the way in which he protected himself tried.

But it often feels like individual rights, the right to “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” are merely symbolic, if not smoke and mirrors. It’s the mask America wears, and not the heart beating in the chest.  America seems more interested in protecting private property and capital than it does in the individual rights of people, and nobody lives this reality more painfully and vividly than the African-American community. White fear, a terror that things will be taken from them, has made blacks– who were once property on this soil–an implicit threat, a deadly, almost mystical weapon in and of themselves, that must be dehumanized and controlled, but never truly accepted.

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Venerable Brother Silver,

It is with great joy that I write to you, as it is as if our prayers have been answered!

Los Angeles Clipper’s owner Donald Sterling’s ill-publicized remarks about the black race and other similar minority groups, and the subsequent public outcry in opposition to those remarks, have created a golden opportunity for the Vatican!

Clearly, as the appearance of good public relations is essential to managing a business, it is incumbent on the NBA to force the Jew owner to sell the team, and long has the Vatican wished to own an NBA franchise, for truly basketball is God’s game!

Dominus autem benedixit repercussu.

As you know, we have unlimited, eternal wealth and could easily afford the purchase and maintenance of the franchise. We think that the marriage of La Sante Sede and the NBA would be a blessed one, offering the league an international presence and a vast, unblinking and docile audience of Christians (superior demographic), and in return the Vatican would receive multiple revenue streams and an opportunity to further promote, and make cool, our message of hope, abstinence and tithing.

Mulieres ordinatur inferius.

We would change the team name to: The Los Angeles Exorcism.

Woe to those who face The Los Angeles Exorcism!

Our logo will be of the image of Christ on the Shroud of Turin, only with basketballs where his eyes would have been. Road trips will be known as Crusades, our cheerleaders (known as The Rapture) will be dressed as provocative nuns, a slam dunk will be called an In-Your-Face-Apocalypse and to successfully shoot a three-point shot will be referred to as “Raining Hellfire.”

We are convinced that this truly great work of awarding the Vatican with a basketball franchise will bring blessings on the world, the NBA and on the Church. For man cannot attain that true happiness for which he yearns with all the strength of his spirit, unless he owns a major sport’s franchise. On this great work, we implore from the God of all holiness an abundance of heavenly grace as we pledge to be a great part of the NBA family!

Our lawyers will be in touch.

Blessings and great light into your life!

Personae homosexuales, vel non pulchra domina, et in sæculum sæculi super eam exorcismo in Los Angeles!

Federico Lombardi