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Italy's Newest Tabloid Is Devoted Entirely to the Pope

Want some photos of the pope? Or some news about the pope? How about a pope crossword? Il Mio Papa has got you covered.
Leonardo Bianchi
Rome, IT

Ever since Pope Francis became the leader of the Catholic Church last year, the mainstream press has gone nuts. Since his ascension to the top of the Vatican, Jorge Mario Bergoglio (his pre-pope name) has been called a “revolutionary,” a “rock star,” and a “superhero.” He was also proclaimed to be a living saint for performing a miracle only a few hours after his investiture in March 2013—when he managed to make Rome’s public transportation work properly (for a couple of hours, at least).

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That was just the beginning. After suffering through the reign of notoriously non-media-friendly Pope Benedict (although Benedict's red Prada shoes regularly made headlines), Italian journalists couldn’t believe their luck when they realized there was finally a pope who regularly rode the bus and carried his own bag and who wasn’t immune to the flu.

So Pope Francis had already been on plenty of magazine and tabloid covers before March 5, when the first issue of Il Mio Papa ["My Pope"], a weekly magazine devoted to His Holiness, hit newstands. Il Mio Papa's editor is Aldo Vitali, who is also behind Italy’s best-selling TV listings and celebrity news magazine, TV Sorrisi e Canzoni ["TV Smiles and Songs"], and the official press release announced that Il Mio Papa would have “a positive and popular point of view, with colorful layouts and highly emotional pictures.” The publisher, Mondadori (which is owned by the family of former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi) has high hopes for the publication, as it has an announced circulation of 3 million and a PR campaign that includes banners in St. Peter’s Square in Vatican City.

(It may or may not have been inspired by a Photoshopped parody of Tiger Beat featuring Pope Francis that was on the website of left-wing magazine Mother Jones over a year ago.)

It's sort of odd to launch a new weekly magazine at a time when the print media is supposedly dying, but Vitali seems to believe that the pope's appeal can overcome publishing trends. In a letter to his readers, the editor wrote: “The Pope never stops—every day he surprises us with his firm decisions and his unpredictable gestures… If you are reading these lines it means that we have something in common: an admiration and deep appreciation for Pope Francis.” Il Mio Papa, he continued, will aim not so much to “celebrate” the world's top Catholic but to “help him spread his message.”

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I leafed through the first issue (it's 68 pages long and costs 50 cents) to get a sense of what that looks lik, and found that the tone of the articles was, generally speaking, “The pope always hugs the children passed to him by their parents," and “Often mothers ask for a kiss for their child and the pope is always surrounded by children who are happy to be next to him,” or “Pope Francis is constantly showing his enthusiasm for his devotees, and St. Peter's Square is everyone’s home.”

The best part is the photos that resemble the candid celebrity shots commonly found in tabloids, except, instead of D-listers groping C-listers in taxis, you get Pope Francis “walking among the happy crowd” in St. Peter’s square. You also have pope-related news items, like the one below (at left) about how there's going to be a TV show inspired by the pope's life in Argentina between 1976 and 1981, “when he opposed Jorge Rafael Videla’s regime, helping the underprivileged.”

After the “political” section (bo-ring!), ll Mio Papa advises readers on how to enjoy the Angelus prayer in St. Peter's Square (“You can see the pope better from the first quarter of the square, on the right”) and offers glimpses into the pope's personal life: He “declined to live in the Papal apartments” and “prefers to live in a hotel room.” That one comes with a map of the papal apartments that looks like a children's-book illustration:

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Readers can also treat themselves to a pull-out centerfold of the pontiff that could decorate “your room or your place of work” so that “the pope's smile and prayers will always be with you.”

Toward the end you'll find a photo story about the pope’s first year in the Vatican, in which you can spot the selfie he took with some kids in August 2013, captioned “A technological pope.” A few pages later you can find a guide to signing up for Twitter in order to “receive Francis’s messages on your phone (it’s easy and free)”.

Page 55 is by far my favorite. Headlined “Francesco Helps Us,” it maps out the components of the Pope’s “five-finger prayer” (for an English explanation of the five-finger prayer, click here).

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The magazine's ads make it clear that Il Mio Papa's target demo is older people who are having trouble pooping. “'Kilocal Woman' helps you fight weight gain” reads one. “Wake up your bowels and fight constipation” is another tagline, and not far away is “Recharge your bowels with good bacteria.” There are also ads for hearing aids, beauty creams, and products that make “your legs look like they did when you were 20.”

What does the actual pope think about Il Mio Papa? Well, judging from this interview with newspaper Corriere della Sera, he's not very happy—he told the interviewer that he doesn’t want to be portrayed as a superhero or a rock star, because he's still a man that “laughs, cries, sleeps calmly, and has friends like everyone else. A normal person.”

Good luck with that, dude.

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