Future of tweets from pope uncertain
2013-02-16 22:12
Vatican City - It could have been the tweet of the century.
But Pope Benedict decided not to announce his resignation on
Twitter, which he joined last year in a foray into social media that has reaped
uncertain spiritual returns and could be curtailed by his successor.
Obviously keen to avoid any leak of his resignation - which
would have been a risk as his tweets are typed up by an aide - the pope
announced it in person, in Latin, to a restricted group of cardinals. The video
was then given to the world's media.
News of the first pontiff to resign in seven centuries
scorched through Twitter, generating 1.5 million comments in the first 36
hours, according to analytics firm Crimson Hexagon.
Trolls
But of those, a third were negative, criticising the pope or
the Roman Catholic Church, and 38% were jokes. Just 7% were positive,
expressing concern for the pontiff or hope about the future.
"We are receiving tweets that I consider not worthy of
a human person," said Archbishop Claudio Maria Celli, head of the
Pontifical Council for Social Communications, a Vatican office set up in the
1940s to address the flourishing film industry, but which under Benedict
branched into Twitter, YouTube and smartphone download "The Pope
App".
An easy target of internet "trolls", the pope has
come in for plenty of online abuse.
"It's a problem," Celli said in an interview in
the marble-floored offices near St Peter's Basilica that house the
communications hub. "When you are offending in a vulgar way, that is not
worthy of a human being."
Nevertheless, the 85-year-old was not "naive" in
joining the micro-blogging site synonymous with instant news, irreverence and
mob behaviour. "The idea of the Holy Father was simple: I want to be
present where people are present," Celli said.
There was no hint of the resignation in recent tweets, sent
from a locked room in the Vatican from a computer kept especially for the
purpose and fortified against possible hacks.
Last Sunday, one day before the announcement, he tweeted:
"We must trust in the mighty power of God's mercy. We are all sinners, but
His grace transforms us and makes us new."
The only tweet from @Pontifex since then was on Ash
Wednesday, the start of lent this week, when he reminded his more than 1.5
million online followers the Christian fasting period had begun.
The Vatican's communications apparatus, put in place mostly
by Benedict's predecessor, is readying for its busiest weeks since John Paul
II's death and Benedict's election in April, 2005.
The day Benedict announced his resignation, hits on the
Vatican's news website jumped from 14 000 to 190 000 in a day, forcing
technicians to switch from one to four servers to prevent a crash.
Last tweet
Benedict is likely to send his last tweet on 28 February,
his final day as pontiff before he departs the Vatican in a helicopter.
After that - during the "Sede Vacante" or
"Empty See" when there is no pope - the @Pontifex Twitter account
will be silent.
Anyone with "The Pope App" on their smart phone
will be able to watch for the white smoke that heralds a new pontiff on a live
stream trained on the chimney of the Sistine Chapel.
Benedict's push into online media was part of a battle that
was central to his papacy: to win back believers in the rapidly secularising
developed world. But patchy success means the next pontiff may choose not to tweet.
"It will depend on him for sure. When the new pope will
be elected we are going to present to him such an opportunity," said
Celli.
"We need to touch the imagination of people. We need to
touch their heart. Because we have a lot of new technology, but do you realise
how really difficult it is to communicate with people?"
