Mel Gibson's father claims Pope is gay, out to destroy church

The elder Gibson may not have the troubled history of public outbursts that his son sports, but the apple has apparently not fallen far from the tree.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, the father of acclaimed actor and director Mel Gibson recently gave a radio interview on the "Political Cesspool Radio Program" during which the 91-year-old made various incendiary comments, the most shocking of which deal directly with criticisms of the Catholic Church. The star's aging father has claimed on the radio that "...half the people there in the Vatican are queer..." and later on, when prompted to comment on Pope Benedict's sexuality, alleged that the Pope himself was homosexual. Gibson's comments are all the more damaging, if perhaps less surprising, considering their arrival not long after Mel's latest tirade: a leaked recording of private conversations with his wife in which he threatened her with physical violence and used a number of sexist and racist terms. In 2006 the "Braveheart" star made headlines when he was arrested driving drunk and proceeded to make anti-Semitic statements to his arresting officers.