ROME (AP) — The New Orleans Saints may be one of the worst teams in the NFL this season, but at least they can count on the continued prayers of Pope Francis.

The pope – or at least someone in the Vatican communications office – has been inadvertently supporting the Saints since November 1 – All Saints’ Day – even as the team lost another game and fired its coach.

Thanks to an automatic feature on X, formerly Twitter, the team’s fleur-de-lis emoji is automatically added to the #Saints hashtag. This gave the impression that the @Pontifex account on true saints “are precious pearls and are always alive and relevant.

The comments sections on the handful of papal #Saint tweets in recent days have exploded, with more than twice as many comments as normal tweets from @Pontifex.

“They need more than you can do, Pope Francis. They need to consult the big one,” wrote @DaBears_26 on November 2.

Over the past week, Saints fans have lamented yet another loss to last-place Carolina, which extended the Saints’ losing streak to seven games – their longest since 1999 – and brought their record to 2- 7. And they welcomed the firing of coach Dennis Allen on Monday.

“Even the Pope is happy we fired Dennis Allen,” wrote @JonoBarnes.

Some have mentioned the unwanted distinction Derek Carr earned last week: he became the first NFL quarterback to losing to 31 teams. While others, not Saints fans, asked the Pope for equal time.

“Is there any chance the @HoustonTexans could receive a blessing too? » » asked @DustyLeeCook

The Rev. Matthew Schneider, a prominent voice on Catholic Twitter, has been trying for five years to get the Vatican communications office to resolve the #Saints fleur-de-lis emoji issue, apparently to no avail.

In 2019, he posted a comment on another saintly @Pontifex tweet that automatically referenced the team, urging the Vatican communications office to check hashtags before posting. He did it again last week, this time addressing his request to X.

“It was cute the first time but it’s getting boring,” he wrote.

The @Pontifex account, opened in 2012, is the pope’s official English-language Twitter account. The pope tweets in other languages ​​in variations of the handle.

The Vatican spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment Thursday evening. For the record, Francis is a lifelong fan of the San Lorenzo football club from his hometown of Buenos Aires.

See a spelling or grammar error in our story? Click here to report it. Please include the title.

Subscribe to Fox 8 YouTube channel.

Copyright 2024 WVUE. All rights reserved.