I find any photo of Emeritus Pope Benedict XVI (a title he gave himself) extremely irritating. Spectacularly uncharismatic at any time, even when- no, particularly when- he is smiling, I find the white cassock very annoying. Surely only the Pope wears this? And he is no longer the Pope ?

Two quite famous questions spring to mind. One is from the little girl who, seeing Princess Margaret for the first time, asked ‘Mummy, what is that lady for ?’ The other is from Metternich at the Congress of Vienna. A delegate stood up to speak, took a heart attack and died . Metternich turned to a colleague and asked ‘What do you think his purpose was in that ?’

The most irritating photo of all must be the one which appeared on local Facebook recently. There he is, sitting on a park bench .He is wearing what is known on Amazon as a flat cap, but to us as a bunnet. It is, of course, a white bunnet. Now I know Papal crowns fell into desuetude some years ago, but come on. A white bunnet?

The camera angle precludes a look at the skip, s I cannot see if it has the Keys of Peter in gold on it. But one must remember that he has always been rather a dandy, once indeed nicknames Pope Prada. Once- about a hundred years ago-the symbol was a working class symbol and not just in Scotland. Having recently found out that one can pay £38 for one that doesn’t melt in the rain, I think we can forget the solidarity bit.

He was also quite a lad for the Gucci moccasins. So much so, that it was solemnly noted that immediately after his resignation he adopted a Mexican leather pair. Unfortunately, we are not told if he abandoned those red socks so beloved of the late Rev. Ian Paisley. What a pity ! There are of course many who believe that thinks he s still wearing them.

It would be a pity if readers felt that this blog was deteriorating into argumentum ad hominem and cheap gibes. Believe us, you’ll know wen we are. All we ask, to adopt the frequent inquiry of Del Boy in ‘Only Fools and Horses’, is quite simply ‘What is his game ?’ Some may feel we being disrespectful to a pope, but he is no longer a pope, which is our point. The expression is ‘If you can’t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen ‘. He apparently couldn’t- stress, health- but he’s still there and is very much in the way of the cook. He was too ill to go on as Pope, but not ill enough to leave the Vatican which he has haunted as Pope Doppelganger the First, and last, I imagine.

The mechanics of any organisation , as anyone who has ever worked n one, however primitive, will know, can be both simple and complex. Firstly, you can’t have two bosses. Secondly, the Emeritus has spent most of his life in the Vatican, apparently having learned nothing from the Byzantine intricacy which, inexplicably to most of us, governs its workings. Can it really never have occurred to him what a nuisance he must be ? Oh, come on ! Has it been just a spectacular illustration of he difference between sense and stupidity?

He has laid himself open to he conspiracy theorists. The most magnificent and laughable is that he resigned deliberately to undermine anything progressive that a successor might attempt. Well, he’s asked for that.

It was childish for us to imagine that Pope Francis would be able to organise the provision of the Eucharist overnight for the billion who depend on the Roman Rite for this. He does not seem to realise that it is probably too late , and that the world has passed the Rite by. The Amazon Synod was an opportunity to extend ordination to parishioners and bring the Eucharist to the 50000 parishes without priests. But he could not bite the bullet, and instead endorsed the odd notion that celibacy is essential for providing the Eucharist.

He has had many problems, and the Emeritus and his retinue may prove to have been the greatest, as he actually walks about the Vatican Gardens dressed as a pope. But what could Pope Francis have done ? To have had the Emeritus frogmarched away by the Swiss Guard would have alienated even more those reluctant to accept any change in a Church apparently prepared to ignore the appalling scandal of the secular clergy’s paedophily.

Has the situation got to Pope Francis? Quite probably in my opinion. He is 83 yeas old, has probably given himself too much to do,and may well be exhausted by both looking to the future and watching his back. His main concern must always be China, always the dragon in the room in 2020 soon possibly the the most powerful country in the world,and how to bring it the Eucharist. And yet this old Emeritus has created a unique niche for himself as an obstacle to a Pope’s work- now, of all times ?

The Poe’s failure to extend ordination need not define his Papacy. We must hope has time yet, and that belatedly, the Emeritus may learn sense.