Pope Benedict XVI sent out his first tweets to more than a million followers Wednesday morning from an iPad.
The Vatican posted a video of the white-robed pontiff gingerly posting from his black Apple tablet.
"Dear friends, I am pleased to get in touch with you through Twitter," he wrote. "Thank you for your generous response. I bless all of you from my heart."
The pope's first tweet from his verified account, @Pontifex, has nearly 44,000 retweets. Typed by an assistant and sent by the pope, future tweets will be written and posted by assistants under Benedict's guidance, the Vatican said.
The pope only follows seven other Twitter accounts, all of which are papal profiles that translate his tweets into other languages. Under all eight, he has more than a million followers.
