'As empty gestures go, impressive': WaPo's Jennifer Rubin mocks Pope Francis' visit to Russian embassy over Ukraine invasion — and gets torched for it

Pope Francis visited the Russian embassy to the Holy See on Friday to express concern over Russia's invasion of Ukraine — a move that Reuters characterized as an "unprecedented departure from diplomatic protocol."

The outlet said Moscow's ambassador, Aleksandr Avdeyev, told the RIA Novosti news agency that during the 40-minute meeting, Francis expressed "great concern" about Ukraine's humanitarian situation and quoted the pontiff as calling "for the protection of children, the protection of the sick and suffering, and the protection of people."

Replying to a tweet from NBC News' chief foreign correspondent Richard Engel on the pope's appeal, Rubin remarked, "As empty gestures go, impressive."

As you might imagine, a number of Twitter users who caught wind of Rubin's five-word dismissal of Pope Francis' rare act were equally dismissive of Rubin and her words:

* "Yeah Jen, there definitely aren’t over a billion Catholics to be spoken for, and the Holy Father has never played a role in liberating Eastern Europe, definitely not a thing that happened 30-40 years ago," one commenter noted.

* "Like changing your Twitter name to 'I stand with Ukraine.' What does that even mean?"... (Read more)

Tweets mentioned:

https://twitter.com/JRubinBlogger/status/1497195739809734656

https://twitter.com/ajusc21/status/1497217864155254787

https://twitter.com/JerseyFinFan/status/1497246051136413720

https://twitter.com/PapaPapist/status/1497221024672141318

https://twitter.com/JenStroup/status/1497262976482611205

https://twitter.com/Mcl31458Mary/status/1497208300554928132

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