Its not everyday that you read a celebrity news on a catholic newspaper. But the latest issue of L’Osservatore Romano, Vatican’s official newspaper, has its own take on Michael Jackson’s death. Yes brothers and sisters, this is indeed a rare sight to behold. This unusual surprise was due to the change that the newspaper is currently experiencing at the hands of its new editor-in-chief, Giovanni Maria Vian. The newspaper heralded Michael Jackson’s musical legacy by saying:

“But will he really be dead? It wouldn’t be surprising if, in a few years, he was spotted in a gas station in Memphis, perhaps with his former father-in-law Elvis Presley, another of those myths – like Janis Joplin, Jim Morrison, Jimi Hendrix or John Lennon – that never die in the imagination of their fans. And Michael Jackson, who died yesterday at the age of fifty, is definitely a pop music legend.”

According to Reuters:

The tribute reviews Jackson’s career, from the time “when he was still black” through his “humanly difficult … crossover” to “new genres not entirely attributable to any specific area, where one cannot distinguish between black and white.” It praises his mega-album Thriller “which is known also to those who do not frequent these musical worlds” and calls him a “great dancer” (grande ballerino).

The article ends on the delicate issue of accusations of paedophilia, a cloud that hung over Jackson’s later years and has dogged the Catholic Church as well. The singer hit his artistic peak with Thriller, it said, but always stayed enormously popular. “Not always, unfortunately, for artistic reasons,” it wrote. “His judicial ups and downs following allegations of paedophilia are well known. But no charge, even as bad and shameful, was sufficient to diminish his legend among the millions of fans around the world. The proof of the emotional reactions aroused by the news of his death. News many don’t believe. Maybe someone in Memphis has already seen him.”

The sudden changes in the Vatican Newspaper started when it ran a few weeks ago colored pictures on the front page which is not usually done for almost 140 years of its existence. Before, the newspaper was published in black and white, now its starting to catch up with the modern times. It is as if its running towards the direction of the current changes in the Vatican information service, wherein social networks and internet became a great instrument in spreading the word of the Gospel to the faithful including the messages of the pope. We are now seeing the fruits of the Vatican II wherein the Chatolic Church is now adapting to the changes brought by the modern times and using these changes for the Glory of God.