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Vatican reactivates pope's @Pontifex Twitter account

The pope's Twitter handle is live again as Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio steps up to lead the Catholic Church and sends his first tweet.

Donna Tam Staff Writer / News
Donna Tam covers Amazon and other fun stuff for CNET News. She is a San Francisco native who enjoys feasting, merrymaking, checking her Gmail and reading her Kindle.
Donna Tam
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As the Vatican taps Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio to lead the Catholic Church, the pope's Twitter account has been reactivated. Bergoglio's first official Tweet as @Pontifex was "Habemus papam franciscum," which means, "We have a Pope Francis."

Apparently, the account was actually the Vatican's official account, but was changed to @Pontifex after a the new pope was chosen, according to CBS News.

The original @Pontifex Twitter account went into hibernation this past month in light of Pope Benedict XVI's decision to resign from the papacy due to health reasons.

Pope Benedict XVI joined Twitter in December, garnering more than 1.5 million followers before he ended his tweeting. @Pontifex now has more than 1.6 million followers.

Update, 1:08 a.m. PT : Updated with more details about the new account.