As Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio emerged Wednesday at a joyous Vatican and took the papal name Francis, there was no joy on Facebook for guys with the name Francis Pope—or Frank Pope, for that matter. Of course, at least one Franklin "Frank" Pope we found, a 32-year-old Lutheran from Chicago, is used to the ribbing by now. Frank, one of many Popes whose Timelines are beginning to grow holy seeds of bad jokes, runs what he describes as a skateboard contracting company. And his friends on Facebook were the first to connect him to the new head of the Catholic Church:

And then Frank retaliated:

Reached by phone shortly thereafter, Pope, who seemed rather unfazed by the new papal connection to his name, explained to The Atlantic Wire that he just "made a cheesy joke." Pope jokes, it seems, are old news to people with the name Pope. "When your last name's Pope your whole life you get it," he said. His father's name was the more common Pope name, John. 

Of course there are other Francis Popes, but if they had Twitter accounts those are already buried by the mass of parody accounts.

Other existing Francis Popes of the world include a British actor/writer, a chemist, and a Big Nate character (whose middle name is Butthurst). Perhaps the most notable Frank Pope, at least by way of Google search, is a writer who has been ocean correspondent for British newspaper The Times. 

Sorry Francis/Frank Popes. The inverse of your name is now immensely more famous than you are. But be nice to the new guy. He's still getting used to the name change. 

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Esther Zuckerman