While his pronouncement that there were no animals present at the nativity may be theologically sound, it's likely to turn the season of peace on Earth and goodwill to all men into one of envy and back-biting – at least in primary schools.
You're a parent already seething that that wee scut Donal from up the road has landed the part of Joseph while little Rebecca, Miss Goody Two-Shoes herself, is down to play Mary.
Your own little Marty (second donkey, front end) comes home in tears to say his part has been dropped from the play.
Next day, you head down to confront the teacher, demanding to know who prompted the change to the cast.
"The Pope," comes the reply from the casting director (teacher).
Talk about bleak mid-winter.
We suspect that most school nativity plays owe more to Richard Curtis's Love Actually than any Vatican opinion.
In the film's school Christmas show, the birth is attended by, among others, an octopus, a lobster and a large blue whale.
Is there any point, do you think, in asking Curtis to write the Pope's scripts?