On 26 September 2022, Giorgi Abashidze made a publication on Facebook with the following photograph and caption: “Hurry up! Quickly! A batch of new and modern LGBTQ+ crosses are now up for sale and you need to hurry, the stock is limited : )))”

With the combination of the publication text and the photograph, the aforementioned Facebook user claims that the Pope wore the so-called LGBTQ+ cross and responded sarcastically.

However, in fact, Pope Francis did not wear a LGBTQ+ cross. Although, one of the crosses that the Pope wears in the photograph does look like the colours of the rainbow.

The picture was taken in 2018 and was uploaded on 17 October 2018 on the official Twitter account of Vatican News (the communication service of the Holy See). The published photograph included the caption: “Panama youth, together with Latin America’s many synod fathers, handed over the World Youth Cross to Pope Francis whilst the Pope himself greeted them joyfully and blessed them. The colours of cross, transferred to the Pope, denote different regions of Latin America’s youth: Green is for Mexico and Central America, Yellow is for the Caribbean region, Red is for Andean region and sky blue is for the southern cone region.”

The cross was developed by the Latin American Bishops’ Conference.

It is also visible that the colours of the cross in the photograph differ from the colours of the LGBT flag. See the LGBT flag colours in this photograph:

Therefore, Pope Francis did not wear the LGBTQ+ cross and, in fact, it was a cross of Latin America’s youth. Hence, the aforementioned publication is fake news.

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