It's the season of goodwill and a time to be jolly. Well not for Roman Catholic Cardinal Jorge Medina as Madonna's world tour rolls onto his patch in Chile, much to his displeasure. The man in a frock believes that the singer causes "impure thoughts" and "lust" in concertgoers. Has he seen Madonna lately? Or ever? This is clearly a man with his finger nowhere near the pulse of popular culture - the sight of Madonna scarecrow-ing around in a purple leotard with her dry old bones clicking has caused many people to utter the name of Jesus and cross themselves.

In the middle of a mass the Cardinal broke off from his usual homily to pour scorn on the singer, whose fans had camped out for three days in order to get tickets for her shows this week in Santiago.

"This woman comes here and in an incredibly shameless manner, she provokes a crazy enthusiasm, an enthusiasm of lust, lustful thoughts, impure thoughts."

See, they come over here with their sexy dancing, etc. He really has never seen her in action, has he? It's good to see the Cardinal trotting about on his moral high horse and addressing the truly important issues in life. The mass he interrupted, by the way, was in honour of the late dictator Augusto Pinochet, whose 17-year reign saw the death of thousands of dissidents in the country, but much better to concentrate on Madonna, eh?

For once, I feel some sympathy for Madonna (well, it is Christmas). Naturally now she's divorced we all want her out of the UK, but what say we have a whip-round and put down a deposit on a lovely little house in Santiago? Right next to the cathedral is a lovely area, I hear.

by Ian McShane