“We cyberly when we woke up.”
Photo: Tiziana Fabi / AFP via Getty Images
When the white smoke died from a chimney on May 8, announcing that the Papal conclave had chosen a new pope, the first story that many saw the trumpet on X was Pope Crave, a parody account that relentlessly recovered the inspector and the successors of the process. At the big moment, Pope Crave beat the Vatican News, the BBC and CNN by a few minutes – hours, in social time. Pope Crave has become the source of new favorite Catholics of social media during the two and a half weeks since the death of Pope Francis, approving a candidate (Luis Antonio Tagle, the popular Philippin who did not end up winning), and, in the hours after the name of Pope XIV, “you are loved and belonging here”. Quickly, Pope Crave became as reliable as CNN and, with regard to the film Conclave,, Even more than politico Europe, a outlet that they recently checked.
Directed by Susan Bin, who studied art history at Harvard, and Drueudonym (a pseudonym), a lawyer who works in the Catholic Queer ministry, Pope Crave began in December as a fan of Oscars seasonal Oscars for the Edward Berger film. Bin and Cabaliero used it to promote Zine charity in support of the intersex funds for human rights, freedom funds and Palestinian librarians and archivists. In the wake of Francis’ death, however, the story pivoted Conclave to “Conclave”, becoming an online beloved character in the process. And once the conclave started, Pope Crave published both memes and live reports from the Vatican, through fans on the ground that contacted the account on X.
Only a few hours after the Curia selected Cardinal Robert Prévost from Chicago as the first American pope, Bin jumped on a call with Vulture to discuss the account, Pope Leo XIV and even Catholicism. “”Make a zine, make a film like ConclaveOr doing a meme is political in times of fascism – it’s super damn politics, “says Bin.” Cobling together a community to watch a fucking fireplace because of a film is political. “”
Where were you when you saw white smoke?
I’m in Dallas right now. I am not the person in Rome, unfortunately, but perhaps the next conclave. I had initiate information according to which a decision was made by the end of the day. So we had our memes ready. I raised all the different monitors. I expected it. I was like, I need to beat the BBC. I need to beat the consumer media. And then I was like, Thank God, I can finally sleep. I no longer have to wake up at 3:00 am.
CHRISTMAS and I were fighting for our lives today. She is Catholic and in queer ministry and has a much more prestigious background than me. I’m just there for the same way, shit and make art. We are very serious people who do non -serious things.
What was your reaction when you heard it was Pope Leo XIV?
I knew his epithet: it is the least American American. Cristelia knew more than me because she is the real expert who is in a group with cardinals. I am not. I try to know enough. The first impression was that it was an American, who has a lot of luggage if you are American Catholic. But then you discover that he did not spend most of his time in the United States, which makes the memes of Chicago funny because I am like, It’s really not ours, but agree. He was in Peru! As soon as it has been announced, Cristelia called me and was like: “Okay, here are the fleas, that’s what we know about him. This is what the streets say.” There are a lot of things that we don’t know that we are going to discover throughout its papacy, and it was true for Francis, it was true for John Paul II. I will not talk about Joseph Alois Ratzinger because I have opinions about him.
The first tweet that made me laugh was someone who said: “Wow, JD Vance is such a bad Catholic that Curia elected an American pope.” And I said to myself: “Yeah, it’s a statement.”
What is his personality from the point of view of a meme? Who is online public?
What was Pope for two hours?
You are meter About him.
I would like to be able to give you someone Conclave (2024) to compare it to … for the moment it is the American. We are just going to make American and memes of Chicago. He was strengthening JD Vance, we like to see that. He was on Snoopy Twitter.
Snoopy Twitter?
The memes of snoopy humor are what he retreweeted. You know, in the script, the character of John Lithgow is super online. He has a twitter and he talks about trendy hashtags. This is not what Leo looks like, but there is a novelty to have popes on Twitter.
People call him Pope Woke.
I wish! We will cyberinate it while waking up. We love a pope awake.
The Crave Pope account made a really serious article on Pope Leo XIV and LGBTQ rights. How do you balance shit and awareness?
We are a Conclave The Zine and the same count, and we come from a place of sincerity. In my opinion, the film is a text on faith and doubt. In the film, you have the most visible representation of an intersex individual in all the media. I cannot name another intersex character! It has a very important message if you are strange or marginalized, you always belong to this church. In fact, not only do you belong, but you are the fucking pope.
At least for the moment, people are very emotional. It was a big day and there is a lot to learn about this new pope. It is something that affects Catholics, but the Catholic Church affects people far beyond Catholics. It affects global affairs, whether or not you practice Catholicism. Make a zine, make a film like ConclaveOr making a meme is political during fascism – it is super fucking politics. Cobling together a community to watch a fucking fireplace because of a film is political.
What will be the role of Pope Crave to go ahead? Are you going to continue to cover Catholic affairs?
I love being a Vatican journalist. We did twitter to support the Zine, and the Zine focused on marginalized platform creators. And that’s what we did. We had other projects to come before the Pope decided to die. (Do you rest in power, Frankie.) So, are we going to be exclusively a source of new Catholics Superserious? This is a question for Christmas to which I cannot answer. I lobed all the real Catholic things in its own way.
But do you want to be a space where people can come together online to talk about the Pope to move forward?
Why not? I don’t think people should consider us a kind of final source. We are not going to announce news on what Pope Leo does, but he is in our eyes and we have opinions. We were very vocal on Palestine and we are super gay. This is what the account has always been, and therefore if Pope Leo is part of the conversation, he is. But it is not like we are going to account for his meals.
How did you know that you wanted to take this conclave seriously, even if the Oscar race was over?
CHRISTMAS and I had very deep talks on the Catholicism of a place of seriousness. We knew that the health of Pope Francis was going badly and we said: “If he dies during the Oscar race, we are going to go to Rome and cover the conclave.” Then he passed Easter Monday, which took us surprised. We did not plan this. We are both super used right now, so we could not be physically there for the conclave, but we had the plan in place. It was never a question of “if”, it was just when. We knew what we were doing: there will be memes, it’s going to be smoke-watch. Timing took us off guard.
Was there a negative response from Catholics devoted to you guys?
Trad Caths is crazy. Catholics have very strong opinions on the Pope. But literally the greatest controversy we had on our behalf was whether you are supposed to say “and with you” or “and with your mind”. So it was fun. I do not take the trolls of commercial cathors seriously because I am doing research on their sub-rose.
How did you fall in love Conclave?
I generally don’t like films like Conclave. I have a film context, and I generally like movies that don’t make you feel good when you leave the theater. I like the films that attack the spectator. But I went to see conclave on October 22 and I was doing a lot of electoral volunteer. I was committed in the elections. I was like, Ah shit, there is a fascist in this film. But then the film ended and I said to myself, I want to go out. It’s crazy when you watch a movie and makes you want to turn off. The feeling I had in the theater when the credits rolled was very festive.
Do you think America is ready to be an American pope?
I think I will see some of the worst tweets that I will never see in my life for a while. People think he is a leftist Marxist. But if the Curia, which has been locked up for more than three years, elected an American pope so quickly, then I suppose that America must count with an American Pope.
