How did you learn a new pope had been elected?
Were you glued to a livestream? Maybe you got a push alert. Or, if you are a particularly online type of person, you might have learned from the X account @ClubConcrave, a fan account for the 2024 film about a dramatized papal election process. In recent days, the account has become a source not just for memes but also for regular updates from Vatican City.
Susan Bin, a 30-year-old artist in Dallas, started @ClubConcrave last year after becoming obsessed with the film, growing a small community of similarly devoted fans and creating a “Conclave”-inspired zine to raise money for charity.
When the white smoke started billowing from the chimney of the Sistine Chapel on Thursday, Mx. Bin, who runs the account with another administrator, was ready to post the news within seconds, sharing a litany of memes including a cat stylized as a cardinal vaping. (@ClubConcrave, which also goes by Pope Crave, a riff on the popular culture account Pop Crave, beat the official Vatican account to the news by four minutes.)
In an interview that has been has been edited and condensed, Mx. Bin discussed the account’s unlikely path from the fringes of fandom to the mainstream.
Let’s get one thing out of the way. Are you Catholic?
I am not Catholic! I am so not Catholic. I have been to mass once in my life.