The quote was said by Joseph Stalin, autocratic leader of the former Soviet Union. The pope and Stalin's response is so cynical that it just sums up the situation perfectly. This sums up a problem that has existed for the popes since the fall of the Western Roman Empire.
This show picks up where Dan's Thor's Angels show left off. In the early Middle Ages Pagan Germanic-language speakers like the Vikings are a dying breed. Many of their contemporaries wish they'd die faster.