Pope Benedict XVI sent his first personal tweet on Wednesday morning

• Using the handle @Pontifex -- meaning "bridge builder" in Latin -- he posted: "Dear friends, I am pleased to get in touch with you through Twitter. Thank you for your generous response. I bless all of you from my heart."

• An hour after his first tweet, the pope had around 700,000 followers on his English-language account

• The Pope is also tweeting in seven other languages, including Spanish, Portuguese and Arabic