Pope crosses milestone drawing 10 million followers on Twitter

28 October, 2013 - Pope Francis crossed a milestone on Sunday notching up a total of 10 million followers in 9 languages on micro-blogging social network, Twitter. “Dear Followers I understand there are now over 10 million of you! I thank you with all my heart and ask you to continue praying for me," the Pontiff tweeted on his Twitter handle @pontifex. His messages are publish simultaneously in 9 languages including Latin and Arabic. The first non-European Pope in 1,300 years has tripled the number of followers of the handles since succeeding Pope Benedict XVI in March, according to the Vatican. According to websites, this would make the pontiff more popular than the New York Times and just behind rapper Kanye West. At the same time he is way behind the three most followed people on Twitter: pop stars Justin Bieber, Katy Perry and Lady Gaga, who have more than 40 million followers each. The Vatican has long been engaged in using the latest technologies to keep in touch with the world's 1.2 billion Catholics and spread the faith, with radio inventor Guglielmo Marconi setting up Vatican Radio in 1931. The first ever papal tweet was posted on Dec. 12, 2012 by Pope Benedict XVI, who wrote: 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.” Pope Francis on Monday posted another tweet. “We are all sinners. But God heals us with an abundance of grace, mercy and tenderness,” he wrote. (Source: Vatican)