The conclave is one of the world’s most solemn, sacred and consequential elections. It is also a secretive meeting of older men who wear red robes and engage in politicking, scheming and smoking while picking the leader of the world’s 1.4 billion Roman Catholics.

The internet could not resist.

“It’s so wild,” Rob Anderson, an author and internet personality who focuses on pop and L.G.B.T.Q. culture, said of the conclave, which begins on Wednesday. “It’s dramatic and it’s fashion.”

One of the world’s longest-running elections will play out for a global audience that has never been so immersed in social media and fluent in memes. It comes after the release of the movie “Conclave” last year, showing that the pope’s election can be watched while eating popcorn.

Now, after years of growing disaffection with the church, many young people around the world are leaning into the memeability of Vatican pageantry and intrigue.

“The Vatican-core summer has begun,” read a recent article in the Italian magazine Rivista Studio.

In a mix of fascination, irreverence, fandom and possible blasphemy, video compilations of cardinals with Charli XCX soundtracks have popped up online. TikTok creators wearing paper skull caps have mimicked conclave conversations. Influencers have published voters’ guides to the conclave, fan pages for candidates have appeared and rankings of the top contenders based on very un-Catholic criteria have flourished. A meme of a cardinal lighting another’s cigarette gathered over five million views on X.

“All these cardinals are looking impossibly chic in Rome smoking,” Victoria Genzini, an Italian curator who runs a meme page, said in an interview. Since Jude Law starred in the 2016 TV series “The Young Pope,” she said, “there has been a rise of pop gaze about the Vatican.”