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# Bishop in socks showing the Pope sparks debate at Mass in St Peter's Basilica
- URL: https://theparnassian.com/en/v-piatnitsu-na-messe-v-sobore-sviatogo-petra-zamechen-episkop-v-ozornykh-noskakh-s-izobrazheniem-tseluiushchegosia-i-mashushchego-rukoi-papy/
- Published: 2020-02-19T10:41:31.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-02T18:57:00.000Z
- Author: Alexandr Radayev
- Tags: Faith, Pop Culture, Rome, Humour

On Friday a bishop in mischievous socks bearing the image of a kissing, waving Pope was spotted at Mass in Saint Peter's Basilica. The Catholic community is seething like holy water in films about exorcism: the jaunty bishop, whose name remains a mystery to many, is called an idiot, an apostate and a homosexual, while others consider him a jester and an original. Is there anything here to boil over? Only if you are under the hypnosis of the purple cassock and purple socks of Graham Greene's Monsignor Quixote. William Wack is not, and permits himself to depart from the stereotypes. The head of the Diocese of Pensacola-Tallahassee in Florida, one of the youngest bishops ordained in the United States, received his orders at 49 and at once became the subject of scandalous discussion, and precisely because of his love of unconventional colours in hosiery. His photographs in pink socks have literally been anathematised on believers' forums, but Bishop Bill Wack is in no hurry to renounce his inimitable style. Such is the hermeneutics of hosiery

![](https://theparnassian.com/content/images/2026/09/photo_2385@19-02-2020_13-41-31.jpg)