A video filmed in July 2024 in the Vatican was shared with a false claim that it showed Pope Francis visiting the Holy See’s diplomatic post in Indonesia’s capital in August 2024. The claim surfaced during the pontiff’s visit to Jakarta, where he met some religious leaders in Southeast Asia’s biggest mosque and held a mass in Indonesia’s main stadium.
“Mr. Pope Francis visits Vatican embassy in Central Jakarta,” read the caption of an Instagram post on September 4, 2024.
It featured a video of Pope Francis entering a room while cardinals waited for him. Indonesian-language text on the video also repeated the false claim.
The post was shared during the pontiff’s visit to the world’s most populous Muslim country to kick off his Asia-Pacific tour of four countries (archived link).
In Indonesia, he met some religious leaders from the six officially recognised religions in the country and held a mass at Gelora Bung Karno Stadium.
The same video has also been shared on Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok here and here, racking up more than 130,000 views.
However, the video does not show Pope Francis visiting the Vatican’s diplomatic post — known as an Apostolic Nunciature — in Jakarta.
Cardinal meeting in the Vatican
A Google reverse image search found the original video was uploaded to the verified Vatican News Portuguese-language Instagram account on July 1, 2024 (archived link).
It shows Pope Francis leading a formal meeting of cardinals at the Apostolic Palace in the Vatican during a ceremony known as the cause of canonisation, the process of declaring a person a saint in the Catholic Church.
“During the Ordinary Public Consistory for the approval of the cause of canonisation, the Pope decreed that the Blessed Giuseppe Allamano, Manuel Ruiz Lopez and his seven companions, Francis, Abdel Moati and Raphael Massabki, Marie-Leonie Paradis and Elena Guerra, are to be inscribed in the Album of Saints on Sunday, October 20, 2024,” read the caption of the post.
Below is a comparison between the clip in the false post (left) and the original footage on the Vatican News Instagram post (right):
