VATICAN CITY — Cardinal Jorge Mario Borgeglio of Argentina was elected Pope this week in an election marred by faulty voting machines, according to cardinals who were present.
“It’s truly a miracle that they chose me,” exclaimed a 76-year-old Borgeglio, who insists his name never even appeared on the ballot in the first place.
“By the time they announced my name, I had no idea we’d stopped voting,” said a surprised Borgeglio, who was given a paper ballot when his machine malfunctioned. “I didn’t even turn it in, let alone vote for myself.”
Bergeglio, who will be the first South American Pope to lead the Church, selected the name “Francis” as his papal moniker based on a book of “Fun Pope Names” he had brought with him to the conclave. However, cardinals felt little to be amused about by the time voting ended yesterday.
Vatican spokesman Rev. Fredrico Lombardi confirmed that there were “minor glitches” with some of the conclave’s machines, but denied that they affected the final results.
“We’ve had several uncounted ballots, a few switched votes, and all in all, it looks like five people participated,” said Lombardi, who veered from an official press release. “But on the whole, we feel as though God’s divine plan has been carried out.”
Cardinal Angelo Scola of Italy disagreed with Lombardi’s characterization of the results, noting that he was given a paper ballot when his voting machine failed to register his first choice, Cardinal Giacomo Biffi of Italy.
“Whenever I tried to select Biffi, it’d switch my vote to Borgeglio,” said Scola, who took a cell phone video of the glitch and posted it on Reddit. “Obviously I’m thankful I survive the attack, but I’m very upset that Biffi didn’t win.”
Scola’s post trended to first place on Reddit, where members of the hacking group, Anonymous, threatened to “take down Vatican city’s servers” if there wasn’t a proper recount.
Both Cardinals Rodriguez Maradiaga of Honduras and George Pell of Australia complained that their ballots went uncounted when their machines developed consciousness and began physically attacking them.
“We barely survived,” said an out-of-breath Rodriguez, who was found in tattered red robes hiding behind a chipping Michelangelo fresco. “I said to Maradiaga, ‘run, run, don’t look back’ – but he looked, he looked… I don’t know what happened to him.”
According to Vatican sources, Cardinal Bernard Law of the United States delivered a swift kick to the base of his Diabold-designed voting machine when its screen appeared to flicker black. Sources present in the conclave provided a detailed account of the incident.
“Piece of shit!” exclaimed Law as he began to furiously shake the machine’s monitor with his hands. “Come on – you wanna fuck with the Law?” Law was then expelled from the conference for not submitting a vote as required by the conclave rules.
By the end of voting, conclave “poll moderator” Cardinal Paolo Sardi of Italy ordered the release of white smoke from the Sistine Chapel’s roof – a traditional sign that a Pope had been elected, based on his rough translation of a computer printout in Latin script.
When it was revealed that none of the cardinals could actually read Latin script, the remaining conclave voters simply agreed to boycott the machines and choose Bergoglio as a compromise candidate.
“I’m pretty sure he’s Catholic,” said Sardi with a shrug. “That’s really all we care about at this point.”