# Priest killed by falling crucifix while doing priest stuff **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [October 18, 2026, 9:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/priest-killed-by-falling-crucifix-while-doing-priest-stuff/1033954 "2026-10-18T21:23:20Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/q.q.switcheroo/32/5713_2.png) [@Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.Q.Switcheroo)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2026, 4:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/priest-killed-by-falling-crucifix-while-doing-priest-stuff/1033954/81 "2026-10-19T16:26:33Z")
> [@puzzlegal](#): > > I have a friend who watched an opera singer die on stage, during a performance. (I’m pretty sure it was a stroke or something, not a falling prop. But I don’t think that difference matters.) If it’s the same performance I’m thinking of, the singer had a heart attack and fell off a prop ladder immediately after singing the words (in Czech) “After all, one only lives so long.” ---
**Author:** ![Babale](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/babale/32/15666_2.png) [@Babale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Babale)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2026, 4:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/priest-killed-by-falling-crucifix-while-doing-priest-stuff/1033954/82 "2026-10-19T16:28:13Z")
> [@Darren\_Garrison](#): > > Behold, I Come Quickly I’m sure that happens to a lot of guys. I think they make a pill for that now. ---
**Author:** ![Stratocaster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stratocaster/32/16393_2.png) [@Stratocaster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stratocaster)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2026, 4:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/priest-killed-by-falling-crucifix-while-doing-priest-stuff/1033954/83 "2026-10-19T16:28:43Z")
> [@Eonwe](#): > > Personally, this irony elicits a small chuckle and acknowledgement. However, I think that this story has comedic staying power only for those who are deriving joy from the way the irony reinforces their opinions that religious belief itself is laughable (ie; where is your God now?). Well said. ---
**Author:** ![Stratocaster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stratocaster/32/16393_2.png) [@Stratocaster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stratocaster)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2026, 4:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/priest-killed-by-falling-crucifix-while-doing-priest-stuff/1033954/84 "2026-10-19T16:32:46Z")
Fair enough. ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2026, 4:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/priest-killed-by-falling-crucifix-while-doing-priest-stuff/1033954/85 "2026-10-19T16:36:24Z")
“However, I think that this story has comedic staying power only for those who are deriving joy from the way the irony reinforces their opinions that religious belief itself is laughable (ie; where is your God now?).” Yes. That is definitely me, which I don’t mind admitting. ---
**Author:** ![Eyebrows\_0f\_Doom](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eyebrows_0f_doom/32/3119_2.png) [@Eyebrows\_0f\_Doom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eyebrows_0f_Doom)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2026, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/priest-killed-by-falling-crucifix-while-doing-priest-stuff/1033954/86 "2026-10-19T17:14:00Z")
> [@Stratocaster](#): > > We’ve already had non-believers chime in in agreement, so I don’t believe it’s typical of atheists. It is absolutely not typical of atheists. I’m an atheist, I was raised an atheist, but because I am not a sociopath I don’t think people should be killed just because they believe in God. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2026, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/priest-killed-by-falling-crucifix-while-doing-priest-stuff/1033954/87 "2026-10-19T17:15:19Z")
Sometimes you have to laugh because constant crying and/or despair can _destroy_ you. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2026, 5:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/priest-killed-by-falling-crucifix-while-doing-priest-stuff/1033954/88 "2026-10-19T17:42:11Z")
> [@Q.Q.Switcheroo](#): > > > [@puzzlegal](#): > > > > I have a friend who watched an opera singer die on stage, during a performance. (I’m pretty sure it was a stroke or something, not a falling prop. But I don’t think that difference matters.) > > If it’s the same performance I’m thinking of, the singer had a heart attack and fell off a prop ladder immediately after singing the words (in Czech) “After all, one only lives so long.” That sounds right. NYC, sometime in the 1990s? > [@DSeid](#): > > Not the poster but I see the through line clearly? > > Some here feel that institutional religion or Christianity is more evil than an insurance company or Kirk’s brand of conservatism, so pretty much same thing: these are not real people with others who cared about them to them; they are symbols, only symbols. To these people a priest is not a random person but someone doing harm to the world. I see the line clearly too. And i happen to know (because I’m an actuary, and have talked to actuaries who worked with him) that Brian Thompson (the insurance CEO) was well liked by his employees, was new in his role, and understood that there are major problems with the delivery of health insurance and one of his explicit goals was to address that at United Healthcare. Luigi Mangione _really_ picked the wrong victim. But i still understand why some people were delighted by his murder. I doubt the priest was evil, either. Most aren’t. I know a lot of people who have really been helped by the Catholic Church. Including queer people, disabled people, and socially isolated people being cheated by the secular powers that be. ---
**Author:** ![JRDelirious](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jrdelirious/32/9531_2.png) [@JRDelirious](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JRDelirious)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2026, 5:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/priest-killed-by-falling-crucifix-while-doing-priest-stuff/1033954/89 "2026-10-19T17:46:42Z")
> [@EinsteinsHund](#): > > I have the principle never to watch videos of people being killed or dying, not because I couldn’t stand it (I have seen some such videos involuntarily, and they didn’t traumatize me), but because I don’t want to satisfy my hidden sensationalist needs with stuff like that Plus, then the damned algorithm will start showing us other material of that nature or adjacent. And Og help us trying to make it stop once that begins. ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2026, 5:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/priest-killed-by-falling-crucifix-while-doing-priest-stuff/1033954/90 "2026-10-19T17:54:03Z")
> [@Stratocaster](#): > > I don’t believe it’s typical of atheists. Apparently we’ve narrowed it down to a subset. To expand though. Imagine a video of a 13 year old Jewish boy killed as he becomes Bar Mitzavah with that ark (contains the Torah scrolls) falling onto him, literally crushed by the traditions he has just now embraced. Irony. Not funny to most of us I would hope. (Though I would not be surprised if a couple of posters thought so) And probably not funny to many strongly anti religion folk, antisemites, or members of Hamas even. But to some of them. ---
**Author:** ![Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/q.q.switcheroo/32/5713_2.png) [@Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.Q.Switcheroo)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2026, 6:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/priest-killed-by-falling-crucifix-while-doing-priest-stuff/1033954/91 "2026-10-19T18:06:02Z")
Though the aforementioned Mel Brooks did manage to find humor in people being horribly maimed by religious symbols as the 2000-Year-Old Man describing his Star of David factory: > I employed six men, see? One for each point. And they used to run together in the middle of the factory at great speed…We would make two a day because of the many accidents. ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2026, 6:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/priest-killed-by-falling-crucifix-while-doing-priest-stuff/1033954/92 "2026-10-19T18:12:08Z")
Fiction is not reality. Despite Brooks’s comment, I don’t think he’d actually laugh at someone’s death by falling into a sewer. ---
**Author:** ![Gyrate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gyrate/32/3588_2.png) [@Gyrate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gyrate)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2026, 10:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/priest-killed-by-falling-crucifix-while-doing-priest-stuff/1033954/93 "2026-10-19T22:01:27Z")
> [@puzzlegal](#): > > That sounds right. NYC, sometime in the 1990s? Yep. From the internets: > [@](#): > > On January 6, 1996, American tenor Richard Versalle (playing the clerk Vitek) suffered a heart attack and **died onstage** during the premiere of Janáček’s _The Makropulos Case_ at the Metropolitan Opera in New York City, dropping 10 to 15 feet from a sliding ladder right after singing the line, _“You can only live so long.”_ ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2026, 10:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/priest-killed-by-falling-crucifix-while-doing-priest-stuff/1033954/94 "2026-10-19T22:16:36Z")
That’s the incident! My boss (who is a friend) was at that performance. He found it deeply upsetting. ---
**Author:** ![Spice\_Weasel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spice_weasel/32/5435_2.png) [@Spice\_Weasel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spice_Weasel)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2026, 11:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/priest-killed-by-falling-crucifix-while-doing-priest-stuff/1033954/95 "2026-10-19T23:06:57Z")
I have a dark sense of humor, but I don’t feel much mirth here. I shared it with my husband for the irony and even he was like, “Aw, no, he was just doing his priest thing.” I’ve laughed at worse things, probably. But I won’t watch videos of people dying or getting hurt and the idea of it is really upsetting. I’m glad his death was swift. (If it matters, I’m an atheist with a fairly dim view of Christianity.) ---
**Author:** ![Biffster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/biffster/32/339_2.png) [@Biffster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Biffster)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2026, 11:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/priest-killed-by-falling-crucifix-while-doing-priest-stuff/1033954/96 "2026-10-19T23:19:54Z")
For those of us who are not big believers in divine providence or lack thereof, this is just a very sad event for this man’s family and his friends. It is ironic, but it is not really fuel for comedy unless you’re a sick fuck. ---
**Author:** ![Meatwater](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/meatwater/32/20074_2.png) [@Meatwater](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Meatwater)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2026, 12:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/priest-killed-by-falling-crucifix-while-doing-priest-stuff/1033954/97 "2026-10-20T00:54:17Z")
Was he promoted or fired? Had to see the big boss in his office, immediately? ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2026, 3:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/priest-killed-by-falling-crucifix-while-doing-priest-stuff/1033954/98 "2026-10-20T03:24:28Z")
I just saw the uncensored version. It looks like his neck was broken, and he died instantly. ---
**Author:** ![susan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/susan/32/17537_2.png) [@susan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/susan)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2026, 3:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/priest-killed-by-falling-crucifix-while-doing-priest-stuff/1033954/99 "2026-10-20T03:25:27Z")
I’m not sure what this has to do with me saying it’s not funny. ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2026, 3:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/priest-killed-by-falling-crucifix-while-doing-priest-stuff/1033954/100 "2026-10-20T03:26:59Z")
I responded because you were right. It wasn’t funny. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/priest-killed-by-falling-crucifix-while-doing-priest-stuff/1033954.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/priest-killed-by-falling-crucifix-while-doing-priest-stuff/1033954.md?page=6)