A baseball signed by the late Pope Francis has sparked a bidding frenzy between religious fans in an online auction.
With an estimated final sale price of over $15,000 (£11,185), the ball has already attracted $4,341 (£3,237) worth of bids from 13 people.
But if devotees are still keen to buy the authentic signature – there’s still time left to bid.
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The auction ends on 14 May, as reported by What’s The Jam.
The “incredibly rare” item is one of 450 signed balls from the Randy L. Kaplan Collection of Signed Baseballs from World Leaders and Heads of State.
They have been collected since the 1960s and feature signatures from the likes of Nelson Mandela and Barack Obama.
But what makes this baseball even more unique is that it comes with correspondence from the Vatican confirming its originality.
It even reveals that Cardinal Peter K. A. Turkson accidentally signed the baseballs before asking the collector to send them again so the Pope could do it instead.
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He wrote in 2017: “Regretfully, I opened the boxes with the baseballs before reading your message.
“Not knowing they were from you, I signed them before reading your letter with instructions to have the Pope sign the two baseballs.
“Sorry about the oversight. If you have other baseballs, kindly send them.”
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The ball itself is a Rawlings Major League (Manfred) model and the late leader of the Catholic Church simply signed it “Francisco”.
The ball is being sold alongside two sets of rosary beads, glossy photographs of the Pope, and the box that was used to ship it from Rome to the United States, where it is being sold by RR Auction in Boston.
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