VATICAN CITY — Pope Francis on Saturday offered a silent blessing to an audience of journalists and other news media workers, acknowledging that not all of them were Catholic or believers — a rare gesture for a pontiff and a sign of openness toward other faiths and engagement with the secular world.

“Given that many of you do not belong to the Catholic Church, and others are not believers, I give this blessing from my heart, in silence, to each one of you, respecting the conscience of each one of you, but knowing that each one of you is a child of God,” he said. “May God bless you.”

The pope, the former Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio of Buenos Aires, was concluding an audience with thousands of members of the news media and press operators, who have been in Rome for the conclave in which he was elected last Wednesday.