How Conclave and Gen Z turned the papal election into a meme-making apocalypse

Who’d have thought choosing a new pope would produce the funniest memes in ages?

2 weeks ago

We have lived through a bizarre phenomenon – and I don’t mean the actual election of a new pope. Whilst Pope Leo XIV becoming the first American pope is of course a huge part of history and had all eyes on the Vatican, what has been absolutely fascinating is seeing how this conclave and the choosing of the next pope has gained immense interest from those the Church definitely did not anticipate: The terminally online Gen Z. How did we get here? It’s a complicated journey of brainrot that no one had banked on, so here’s how the film Conclave and the memeification of seminal events turned the election of the new pope into a machine that churns out the best memes. And, of course, a roundup of the funniest.

The impact of Conclave

When the Oscar nominated, Ralph Fiennes led Conclave hit cinemas at the tail end of last year – something amazing happened. It found an audience that the filmmakers definitely did not bank on hitting. Conclave, whilst acclaimed, has the aura of a film that would play on a slow Tuesday afternoons to the semi retired – and yet the movie ran away with itself and became a viral hit, chock with memes and a gen z crowd who acclaimed its campy, gossipy ways and compared the pomp of new pope proceedings to RuPaul’s Drag Race.

Like I’m sure many were, Conclave educated me on things I knew nothing about and made me laugh and fascinated me in equal measure. Just as Conclave fever sort of dispersed from the online sphere, something extremely timely happened – Pope Francis passed away.

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A real life conclave was going to happen – just like the movie Conclave. Would this create a more serious approach to how we discussed the new pope? Of course not – the pope election memes about the irl conclave were arguably more deranged than what came before.

The memeification of literally anything important

I am truly fascinated by the dissociation and general meme toned approach to anything important we have as a generation with seminal events. Perhaps it was Conclave fever, perhaps it’s the fear of missing out – but as a generation we have such a hunger for going viral that the ironic interest from non Catholics in what pope the world will have has gone from lighthearted tweeting to desperately meme making anything to go viral and never missing the moment.

It’s a fascinating thing to live through. And also, the tweets and memes are absolutely amazing. So here are some of the funniest and best pope memes in the mix as gen z turn conclave into a frenzy of viral hits.