The Twitter account of the newly elected Pope Francis I is a fake.
The Argentine cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio was named pope during a conclave to determine the next head of the Catholic Church, after Pope Benedict XVI unexpectedly resigned from the position last month. A Twitter account for the new pope quickly popped up shortly after the announcement was made.
Unfortunately, the person behind the account isn’t actually Pope Francis I , who was elected after a couple of days and only four ballots. In the past, seven ballots have been the average required over the last nine papal conclaves. But in 1939, Pope Pius XII was elected within only three ballots, so Pope Francis’s election was relatively fast compared to his predecessors.
Whoever made the @JMBergoglio account tweeted what would surely be controversial issues were the real Pope Francis behind them. In one tweet, “Pope Francis” says that kids are going to love him more than Santa Cluas, and that the Church must protect children by not allowing homosexual adoption.
Incidentally, the JMBergoglio account has been active since April 2012, meaning that someone has been impersonating the newly elected pope on Twitter for almost a year. The account quickly racked up over 130,000 followers, although how many of them had already been following the account is unclear at the moment.
Si soy el nuevo Papa, los niños me van a amar más que al Papa Noel #Vaticano
— Jorge M Bergoglio (@JMBergoglio) February 28, 2013
Sólo la iglesia debe protejer a esos niños, abrazarlos, mimarlos, darles calor, darles amor, darles… eh eh #NoALaAdopciónEntreHomosexuales — Jorge M Bergoglio (@JMBergoglio) February 17, 2013
Quizás peco de humildad al decir que soy un simple representante de Dios en La Tierra al igual que Dios lo es de mí en El Cielo. — Jorge M Bergoglio (@JMBergoglio) March 13, 2013
If you want to follow the real Pope Francis I, you can find him on Pope Benedict XVI’s old Twitter account, @Pontifex . All of the the previous pope’s tweets have been deleted. So far, only one tweet has been written on the newly reactivated account:
HABEMUS PAPAM FRANCISCUM
— Pontifex (@Pontifex) March 13, 2013
The message was sent to over 1.5 million followers.
Are you following Pope Francis I on Twitter?