Pope Francis called the Carmelite nuns of Luccena in Cordoba, Spain, on New Years Eve, but when they nuns didn't answer, the pope left them a quirky voice mail asking why the nuns couldn't answer the phone, the Associated Press reported.
In another one of the popes "cold calls," Francis reached out to a convent around 11:45 a.m. New Years Eve where he knows some of the nuns from his home country of Argentina. When the nuns didn't answer he left a voice mail saying:
"What are the nuns doing that they can't answer the phone? This is Pope Francis. I wanted to offer you greetings for the end of the year. Maybe I'll try to call again later. May God bless you," the pope is heard saying on the message obtained by Spain's El Mundo newspaper, according to the AP.
The pope has become known to make personal calls to normal people out of the blue, sometimes in response to a letter person wrote, the AP reported. This time, the pope was reaching out to long lost friends.
In the Luccena community where the convent is located, only five nuns remain, three of which are from Argentina, which is how they know the pope, according to the Sydney Morning Herald.
Sister Adriana, the prioress of the Luccena convent, told COPE radio station in Spain she and the other nuns were conducting their midday prayers and did not hear the phone, according to the Morning Herald.
"When my duties allowed me to go to the phone, I literally wanted to die," Adriana said on hearing the missed message, according to the Morning Herald. "I took down the message and passed it on to the other nuns. We told ourselves we had just been fulfilling our duty of prayer. We never thought the Pope would remember us."
Sister Adriana tried to reach the pope and return his call to the Vatican but had no luck. Luckily for the nuns, Pope Francis called back around 7 p.m. that night and wished them a happy New Year, according to the Morning Herald.
"The message from Pope Francis was to never lose hope, because sadness leads to spiritual sloth and hopelessness," Sister Adriana said, according to CNN.
,
