The boy and the bishop

摘要

A few days before Good Friday, the sky in Asuncion, Paraguay's capital, became dark and the clouds poured black rain over the city and left it smelling of ashes. In a Catholic country where a former bishop was elected as president a year ago, such unusual happenings were taken by some as a portent. And lo, the day after Easter the president, Fernando Lugo, admitted to having fathered a child. The boy is almost two years old, which means that Mr Lugo had stopped acting as a bishop when he was conceived. When his affair with the mother started she was aged 24 and he 55. Since Easter two other women have claimed that Mr Lugo fathered children with them too.