By the time Pope Benedict XVI sent his first tweet Wednesday, the 85-year-old leader of the Catholic Church had already acquired more than 600,000 followers. Using the Twitter handle @pontifex, the pope’s first tweet was as cautious as one might expect: “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.” By day’s end, nearly 42,000 people had retweeted the pontiff’s words, and the pope had answered carefully selected questions on faith in eight languages.

Pope Benedict XVI sent out his first tweet while navigating a tablet brought to him at the end of his general audience at the Vatican on Dec. 12. (Osservatore Romano/AP)

For all the faithful who supported the pope’s virtual blessings, there seemed to be plenty of cynics who used Twitter to take aim at the pontiff. The official papal Twitter page only contains the pope’s tweets, but a simple Twitter search for @pontifex or #askpontifex brings up a mix of hate and creative humor directed at Benedict, the Catholic Church, and God.

Twitter, of course, is like a giant public bulletin board on which anyone can post a message. But the backlash against the pope underscored how open the pontiff is to public scorn and just how nasty cyberbullies can be. “There are no moderators on Twitter,” said Claire Diaz-Ortiz, Twitter’s director for social innovation, when the @pontifex handle was announced last week. “So it is a risk any individual who has a Twitter account takes.”

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Pope sends flurry of tweets after Twitter launch (CBS News)

Pope, as @Pontifex, Sends First Tweet, Blessing Followers (ABC News)

With an Assist, Pope Sends First Tweet (New York Times)

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