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          New Orleans Saints welcome Pope Francis' accidental blessings

          • Katherine Terrell, ESPN Staff WriterNov 5, 2024, 08:15 PM ET
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              Katherine Terrell came back to ESPN to cover the New Orleans Saints in the summer of 2022. She left the company in 2019 after joining in 2016 to cover the Cincinnati Bengals. Katherine is a graduate of LSU and a Baton Rouge, Louisiana, native, and she has covered the NFL since 2013. You can follow Katherine on Twitter: @Kat_Terrell
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          The New Orleans Saints will take all the help they can get after seven straight losses.

          The Saints were the inadvertent recipient of a blessing by Pope Francis on X this month. The Pope accidentally included the Saints' hashtag in two different posts this week, with the latest post occurring Tuesday.

          The second post prompted a lighthearted response from the team, which recently fired coach Dennis Allen.

          In April, Saints owner Gayle Benson presented Pope Francis with a personalized jersey during a 10-day trip to Rome and Germany.

          This is not the first time Pope Francis has accidentally given the Saints his blessing.

          In October 2019, he wrote: "Today we give thanks to the Lord for our new #Saints." New Orleans beat the Jacksonville Jaguars 13-6 later that afternoon, and the team marked the date on its X account a year later.