#CharityAuction

Roughly a year ago, Lamborghini customized a Huracán RWD for Pope Francis. This was not a commissioned job but a gift from the automaker to the Vatican. Tragically, His Holiness wasn’t interested in holding onto it so he could more easily cruise for babes and Catholic Church decided the best course of action would be to auction the vehicle off for charity.

While sold by Sotheby’s in Monaco last May for 715,000 euros (about $813,000 USD), it would appear the final bidder either didn’t have the necessary funds or experienced a change of heart. Maybe it was divine intervention. Regardless, the Huracán is now being raffled off for ten bucks a ticket — though you can choose do donate more and better your chances.

Even if you aren’t of the faithful, ten dollars for a nearly new supercar that has been blessed and signed by one of God’s favorite people feels like a bargain. Imagine the stellar track times you could achieve with the Almighty by your side and the Pope’s name scrawled on your dashboard.

Mopar fans are among the most steadfast automotive enthusiasts in history. Their ability to openly express their love for post-war luxury, classic muscle, and turbocharged compacts from the 1980s remains unrivaled. While an advocate for General Motors or Ford can certainly appreciate disparate models within their chosen nameplate, Mopar enthusiasts frequently push the envelope of sanity — at least, that’s the stigma.

If you’re unfamiliar with the stereotype, log into any car forum and write that you’re considering swapping an LS motor into a Plymouth, Dodge, or Chrysler. Congratulations, you just made a dozen new enemies. On the flip side of that coin, owning a vintage Mopar can win you a lot of respect within the community. While not equal in terms of prestige, owning a Dodge Aspen wagon will still net you loads of brownie points with anyone driving a Coronet Super Bee Six Pack or Omni GLH-S. Hell, at this stage in the game you might even get a thumbs up for buying a Plymouth Reliant.

Unfortunately, Chrysler’s immediate future doesn’t look nearly as bright as its often dicey past. That’s especially true for Dodge. The Viper is dead, the Challenger can’t go on forever, and annual sales are less than half of what they were 10 years ago. But its fiercely loyal enthusiast community remains, and they’ll have an opportunity to purchase the final examples of what may end up being the brand’s two most illustrious models.

In the car world, Pope Francis is most famous for abandoning the popemobile to drive himself around in various small hatchbacks. Perhaps thinking he was an automobile enthusiast, Lamborghini gifted him a white Huracán RWD Coupe with gold detailing to match his catholic dressings on Wednesday, just outside the Vatican hotel where he lives.

Unfortunately, while he blessed the crap out of the car, he doesn’t want to keep it. Instead, the church will auction it off to fund the Nineveh Plains Reconstruction Project — a group primarily focused on helping women who were victims of trafficking at the hands of ISIS.

While we wish they would have orchestrated a photo shoot where His Holiness performs a burnout, turning to the camera to look over a pair of wraparound sunglasses whilst uttering “Good God,” we understand he’s supposed to remain reverent — or whatever. It just seemed like a missed opportunity and could have upped the resale value of the car the pontiff laid rubber with. Besides, it would have been for a good cause.

Vast amounts of witless cash arrived at Scottsdale this week. To wit: the first serial production Acura NSX — or, at least, the right to order it — sold for $1.2 million at Barrett-Jackson on Friday.

For that $1.2 million (plus somewhere between $156,000 and $205,700 for the car itself), winning bidder Rick Hendrick (yes, that Rick Hendrick) will be the first “normal” person to enjoy such model-specific features as automatically reversing cat bolts, tires that don’t grip (if so equipped) and a painstaking 12+ month wait to 60 mph.

At least Acura and Mr. Hendrick will get the warm-and-fuzzies. All that crazy auction money will go to the Pediatric Brain Tumor Foundation and Camp Southern Ground in Georgia, and not Honda’s Formula 1 engine development program.