The tweet awaited
around the world
VATICAN CITY, December 12 (AP) — The Pope has tweeted.
In perhaps the most drawn out Twitter launch ever, Pope Benedict XVI pushed the button on a tablet brought to him at the end of his general audience Wednesday. It read: “Dear friends, I am pleased to get in touch with you through Twitter. Thank you for your generous response. I bless all of you from my heart.”
Later in the day he was to respond to a few messages sent to him from around the world. As the countdown to his first tweet from his Twitter handle @Pontifex neared, the pope had garnered nearly 1 million followers in the eight languages of his account.
The opening message and answers to the first two questions...
The Vatican, at the end of the bulletin on today's GA, reports thus:
At the end of the General Audience, right after the papal blessing, the Holy Father sent out his first tweet on a tablet:
Dear friends, I am pleased to get in touch with you through Twitter. Thank you for your generous response. I bless all of you from my heart.
Benedict XVI @Pontifex
Besides English and Italian, the Pope's tweet appears in Spanish, Portuguese, German, Polish, Arab and French under the following accounts: @Pontifex_es; @Pontifex_pt; @Pontifex_de; @Pontifex_pl; @Pontifex_ar; @Pontifex_fr.
The Pope was assisted at his first tweet by Thaddeus Jones, of the Pontifical Council for Social Communications and Claire Díaz-Ortiz of Twitter.
Also present were two students of Villanova University, Mika Rabb and Andfew Jadick, who are currently working with the Pontifical Council for Social Communications, and the Mexican journalist Katia Lopez-Hodoyan.
Today, the Pope was to respond to three questions chosen from those who sent questions to #askpontifex.
It was easier to get this out of the way first before posting on the GA-proper... It's appalling that much of the reporting on this has focused on numbers
and silly questions like will the Pope get more followers than Lady Gaga or Justin Bieber...
God bless this entire enterprise....
[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 12/12/2012 16:36]