The Pope’s first Tweets

Nine days ago, the Vatican launched the first personal Twitter accounts for the Pope, giving Pope Benedict XVI the opportunity to tweet in English (via @Pontifex) and in seven other major languages.

The day these accounts were launched, Pope Benedict also invited the world to send him questions about faith via #AskPontifex. He promised to respond to some of these questions nine days later. And now, with tens of thousands of questions in hand, @pontifex has answered: Today, the Pope sent his first Tweet during a live event at the Vatican attended by thousands.

This Tweet was immediately retweeted thousands of times, and shortly afterwards @pontifex and its seven related language accounts began responding to several questions tweeted in the past week. The first question, asked by Spanish journalist @jcalderero in Madrid, asked:

The Pope responded:

The second question, originally in Portuguese, asked how people can remain hopeful in troubled times. His response:

Third, from an American mother:

The Pope answered:

The Pope will be tweeting regularly from here on. Follow him on any of these accounts:

• English: @pontifex
• Spanish: @pontifex_es
• Italian: @pontifex_it
• Portuguese: @pontifex_pt
• German: @pontifex_de
• Polish: @pontifex_pl
• Arabic: @pontifex_ar
• French: @pontifex_fr 

Posted by Claire Díaz-Ortiz (@claire)
Social Innovation team