Pope Francis wearing a long, white puffer jacket inspired by Balenciaga. Francis rocking aviators and revving a motorcycle down a busy street. Francis turning the tables in a dim nightclub. Francis in a tactical vest, preparing to fly a fighter jet. Francis sharing a beer at Burning Man.
“I had to get involved in the Pope thing,” one Reddit user recently wrote alongside AI images of Francis practicing martial arts, playing basketball and skateboarding. “Jumping on the Pope bandwagon,” another said, sharing an image of the pontiff speaking to a crowd of bikers. Global religious figures such as the pope are natural subjects of political satire and artistic expression, said Jennifer Herdt, a professor of Christian ethics at Yale Divinity School. Francis is ideal, she added, because he “is known for his simplicity, his solidarity with the poorest of the poor,” so when he is the subject of far-out scenarios such as flying a fighter jet, “it’s definitely the height of incongruity, of defying expectations.
Ex // Top Stories Tree check-up urged by SF leader after rain and winds Three people were killed by falling trees or branches during a March storm “People experience Pope Francis as a pope of the people, so you would enjoy putting him in all these places where the people are,” said the Rev. Serene Jones, president and a professor of religion and democracy at Union Theological Seminary in New York.The image that turned Francis into an AI star shows him in a white puffer jacket in the style of Balenciaga, a haute French fashion house, striding down the street.