So you’re hanging out at home one morning, finishing breakfast and skimming through your newsfeed before heading out to work. And then it happens — your phone rings. You don’t recognize the number, and you’d usually let it go to voicemail, but you decide to answer.
“Hello, this is Pope Francis. Is this…”
You hang up because, duh, why would the Pope call you? Why would he call anybody?
That’s precisely what “an ailing Italian man” thought the first two times the Pope tried to contact him:
The newspaper said the man, Franco Rabuffi, hung up twice, thinking it was a prankster.
On the third call, he realized it truly was Francis and was speechless. The paper says Francis told Rabuffi he was amused. Rabuffi and his wife were invited to the pope’s public audience Wednesday in St. Peter’s Square, where Francis hugged them and assured them he really did dial the man’s phone.
Yes, the Pope called Rabuffi three times because, yes, the old man hung up the first two. Talk about being averse to prank calls.
Turns out, Pope Francis really likes to cold call people who send him letters, emails, and other means of communication voicing concern or requesting prayers. His penchant for doing so even earned him a satirical spot in The New Yorker‘s “Shouts & Murmurs” section.
(Via The Huffington Post/AP)