Pope Francis joined Instagram, a photo-sharing, social-media platform, and has already attracted more than 2.1 million followers.
The first post at the account, named Franciscus (visit it at: https://www.instagram.com/franciscus/), was a picture of the Pontiff praying, accompanied by the phrase "pray for me."
Other posts, including more pictures of the Pope at prayer and a video in which the Pontiff delivers a message of mercy, have since appeared.
The account will be managed by the Vatican’s Secretariat for Communications. Dario Viganò, the Vatican’s prefect of the secretariat for communications, said that the Pope’s Instagram postings “will help recount the papacy through images, to enable all those who wish to accompany and know more about Pope Francis’s pontificate to encounter his gestures of tenderness and mercy.”
On Twitter, Pope Francis said that by joining Instagram he was “beginning a new journey… to walk with you along the path of mercy and the tenderness of God.”