Like I Said Before - We Need a TV Network Like This

Last February I posted on this blog the alledged schedule of a new cable network created by Matthew, 1 of the escaped inmates from The Shrine of the Holy Whapping, called Holy Whapping Television Network (HWTN). Well guess what?, I now have more proof that this man has way too much time on his hands. (I thought being a grad from Notre Dame's Architecture School would guarentee a non-stop flow of job offers that would leave one too busy to come up with stuff like this. Apparently not!) Anyhow here it is the newest season of

Holy Whapping Television Network (HWTN)

Schedule for April 22, 2007-April 28, 2007

Sunday

8:00 PM. The Sopranas: Special Encore Presentation - Ba-da-bing! The scion of a notorious Mafia family, now trying to reform his life as a seminarian at the North American College, finds himself drawn into a scheme to take over an illegal ring of cassock-oversleeve smugglers. [Okay, I'll give you a hint. The soprana is a sort of sleeveless academic gown that used to be worn by Roman seminarians...though not at the NAC.]

9:00 PM. Trading Chancels - The late Martin Travers guest-hosts this week’s episode, where we watch the new cathedral in Oakland get turned into a perfect 1/6th scale replica of St. Peter’s Basilica. Meanwhile, something goes horribly awry with the opposing team’s attempt to put vinyl siding on Chartres.

Monday

8:00 PM. House, O.P. - Mangy maverick novice-master Fr. Gregory House, embittered from years of suspicion from his superiors (“never trust a skinny Dominican”), ferrets out obscure heresies on the campus of the Catholic University of America. This week: fears of an outbreak of Montanism paralyze the Dominican House of Studies after unaccounted-for stockpiles of cheese are discovered in the basement by Sister Allison.

9:00 PM. The P.O.D. Couple - Hilarity ensues when Fra Oscar’s cigar and poker night clashes with Friar Felix’s turn to host his weekly ecology class. Can a Franciscan and a Dominican share an apartment without driving each other crazy?

9:30 PM. The Knights of Poverty. “We’re gonna convert a rock star!” A group of lovably bumbling CFRs plot to break into Mick Jagger’s apartment where they will convince the musician to voluntarily give up his wealth.

Tuesday

8:00 PM. Two and a Half Acolytes - World-class mooch Baron Corvo is forced to move into the spare rectory room of disapproving former patron Cardinal Manning after he loses all his money in a scheme to perfect underwater photography. This week’s guest-star: Percy Dearmer as himself.

8:30 PM. When Heretics Attack! - This week: Cathars prey on an unsuspecting young couple visiting Yellowstone National Park!

9:00 PM. American Chorister - Bishop Bruskewitz brings to tears Henry Wooton-Thorpe, Choirboy Third Class from St. Thomas, Fifth Avenue, after a disastrous rendition of Nolo Mortem Peccatoris.

Wednesday

8:00 PM. Frater Magnus - A new season of last year’s blockbuster reality show returns. This time, the rectory is playing host to a member of the SSPX, someone from Voice of the Faithful, a Jesuit, a Priestly Fraternity seminarian, an Opus Dei numerary, a CL member, a Bulgarian Orthodox deacon...and Matthew Fox.

9:00 PM. Dr. Pusey. “Hello, Newman.” “Hello, Pusey.” The saga of America’s favorite sitcom about the Oxford Movement continues. This week, wackiness follows Dr. Pusey and Fr. Faber’s forced apartment-switch after Faber’s disastrous attempt to redecorate his place in the style of an Italian baroque chapel. Meanwhile, Christina Rosetti concocts an elaborate scheme to falsify her street-address so she can order Supreme Flouder from the local Chinese take-away.

9:30 PM Franciscan Feud. This week on the world’s favorite game show for mendicants: Capuchins versus the Sisters of Perpetual Adoration. Watch who wins!

Thursday

8:00 PM. Elias - Ridiculously omni-competent Carmelite secret agent Sister Dionysia Bristow continues her search for secret technology based on the prophet Elijah's chariot of fire, which is also being sought by evil ninjas sent by…um, er, well, we’re not sure what this show is about, but she kicks the crud out of a lot of people, wears really crazy wigs and disguises and there’s something about Cardinal Rambaldi. Go figure.

9:00 PM Veronica and Mars - Christian schoolgirl Berenike and Roman centurion’s son Mars fight crime in the seaside down of Ostia. Much late-Imperial angst and incoherent flashbacks follow.

Friday

8:00 PM.How Not to Vest - The Rev. Mr. Kelly and Sister Anastasia (with her catch-phrase “Tacete!”--essentially, “Shut up!”) offer some emergency tailoring advice and a 5,000 Euro gift certificate to Gamarelli to this week’s lucky contestant—a fashion-challenged fifty-something priest who owns clerical shirts in every color but black.

9:00 PM. CSI: Catholic Saint Investigation - Much unnecessary swoopy computer-animation and neon-lit shots of very small, very wrinkled Italian nuns bent over lab-tables accompany this week’s dramatic attempt to confirm the authenticity of the skull of St. John the Baptist as a child.

Saturday

8:00 PM. Taxis - After Gloria von Thurn und Taxis squanders her ancestral inheritance, gained by two hundred years of a family postal monopoly on the Holy Roman Empire, on buying obscure fur-lined papal regalia for Benedict XVI, she is forced to take a job in Louie de Palma’s Sunshine Cab Company in New York. Also starring Andy Kaufman as Msgr. Gänswein.

8:30 PM. Fr. Ted: The Animated Series. Somehow Mr. T. got involved in this, I’m really not sure why.

9:00 PM. NCIHS. - The crack investigators of the Papal Navy’s police arm do their thing, though nobody can quite remember what the initials stand for, why so many interesting crimes seem to occur around the docks at Ostia, or why their lab tech looks like something out of Aubrey Beardsley.

& for those of you who think the same about me, I only report what I find, unlike Dom Christopher of Abbaye Saint-Wandrille who came up with this potential Network:

From the BBC (Benedictine Broadcasting Corporation):

Blackadder 2 & 1/2

(The Popish Plot)

Grand Inquisitor Michele Blackadder-Ghislieri suffers a brief setback in his ascension to power when his embittered predecessor, Cardinal Carafa, accuses him of blatant Marcionism. But Blackadder's trusty secretary, Mgr. Baldrick, saves the day with a cunning plan: Johann Burchard is re-installed as papal master of ceremonies, and sets about breeding a powerful papal bull under the pontifical secret. During the ensuing conclave, the bull attacks the cardinals' red cassocks, prompting them to elect Blackadder, who thereupon cunningly institutes the "pivilège du blanc." At the new pope's coronation, Burchard (now aged 201, and an immemorial custom himself), announces the bull's name, Quo primum. The pope rides the bull across christendom, firing off Roman Missals as he goees.

"Blackadder, Blackadder, he rides a pitch black steed.

Blackadder, Blackadder, he's very POD indeed. "

Cardinal Allen fans the flames

In a last-ditch attempt to halt the progress of the bull, Cardinal Allen multiplies public acts of faith at Smithfield. However, he seems to over-reach himself when the Jesuit-led opposition blames the loss of Calais on his public invocation of St. Joan of Chichester

Funny, but I don't remember reading anything in The Rule of St. Benedict that allows for this sort of thing. Doing the work of God, yes, doing the work of a a script writer, no. Not even between, as Dom Christopher puts it, his day job & night office! (Don't blame me, the good? Benedictine came up with it himself.)