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Status record

Pope Leo XIV

DIRECTS DUCKS ACROSS ROAD, BLESSES EACH ONE

"The ducks have been blessed and the traffic has been asked to wait," says a lollipop lady on his behalf.

Existence confidence provisional
A generated photo of an anonymous stranger. It is not the person named.
Pope Leo XIV waits for a bus, one hand raised in blessing at a seagull.
Location
Zebra crossing beside a duck pond, three streets from Kraków's Cloth Hall
Currently
Crossing patrol for ducks, blessing each one personally
Last confirmed sighting
Holding a crossing sign at 8:15, blessing ducklings in single file
Observations
Can bless a mallard from the far bank using only a raised eyebrow.

He has taken a post as crossing patrol for ducks on a quiet road beside a market square in Kraków. He stands in a white cassock holding a round stop sign on a pole. Each morning the traffic halts before he has even raised it.

"I sell pierogi from the van on the corner, and I've seen it all," said Halina, a pierogi seller. "He steps out, lifts one hand, and the whole queue of vans goes quiet. Then he blesses the ducks one by one, and a coach party applauds from the pavement."

He is currently working through a flock of forty-one ducks, with a small pointed hat for the slowest. Progress is steady, though the ducks keep waiting for the white smoke before crossing. A drake called Gerald has been told twice to stop turning up on the balcony of the bus shelter.

Guidance for the public

Please wait for the blessing before crossing, and do not feed the ducks anything fried.

Actual status (not satire) No death recorded as of 22 October 2026. Born 14 September 1955. Source: Wikidata

E&OE. The Registry accepts no liability for misclassification, temporal displacement or loss of personhood arising from this record. Photographs are computer-generated approximations and almost guaranteed to show a different person entirely.