Pope Benedict will make a run to Costco later to stock up on oatmeal and candles. Later in the day he'll hit the early bird special at Piccadilly.

Is a gay sex scandal the real reason the pope's retiring? Andrew Sullivan has me convinced!

How the hell does one become the pope? Well, here ya go. You're welcome!

Today's afternoon links, featuring two characters who could be pope and a music video with murderous, magical monkeys.

As you MAY have heard this morning in between practicing Prince's cane walk, Pope Benedict XVI unexpectedly resigned from his post this morning.

Well, friends, another year has come and gone and it’s time to write 2012 into the history books.

Shortly after joining Twitter, Pope Benedict XVI solicited questions with the hashtag AskPontifex. This will surely end well.

Well it finally happened -- Pope Benedict joined Twitter. I'm not sure if this means anything more than it'll provide an platform for some funny trolls, but I am amused by this development nonetheless.

This may come as a surprise to even some Catholics (I grew up painfully Catholic and I can't recall hearing of this), but each year the Vatican celebrates what it calls "World Communications Day" -- a day in which the pope issues an official statement on the state of, well, communication in the world.