Catholic Church, First Global Social Network: Vatican Radio Anniversary

'The new technologies are not only changing the way we communicate, but communication itself, so much so that it could be said that we are living through a period of vast cultural transformation. This means of spreading information and knowledge is giving birth to a new way of learning and thinking, with unprecedented opportunities for establishing relationships and building fellowship.' (Pope Benedict XVI)

P>ROME, Italy (Vatican Radio) - Vatican Radio celebrates its 80th anniversary on Saturday, February 12, 2011. Since being set up by the father of radio, Guglielmo Marconi in 1931, the Radio has been a beacon for transmitting the message of the Church during the rise of Fascism, World War II, and the Cold War. On Thursday evening a special conference on the 80th anniversary was hosted by the Vatican Museums. The keynote address was given by a special representative of the Secretariat of State, Monsignor Peter Bryan Wells. We present excerpts:

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...We are all aware that there is a veritable revolution underway today in the world of media. As the Holy Father stressed recently in his Message for the 45th World Day for Social Communications (24 January 2011): "The new technologies are not only changing the way we communicate, but communication itself, so much so that it could be said that we are living through a period of vast cultural transformation. This means of spreading information and knowledge is giving birth to a new way of learning and thinking, with unprecedented opportunities for establishing relationships and building fellowship."

Technical as much as it is cultural, this upheaval directly involves radio broadcasting both in its technological aspects, and in those concerning content. Classic media, including radio, can no longer ignore the power and pervasiveness of the new media.

Just think: a recent study found that cell phones are habit-forming - they call it "mobile addiction", and since the advent of smart phones, it can become so severe as to force those who suffer from it to go without food rather than be separated from the device that allows them to send and receive calls and text messages (cfr. http://www.digitaltrends.com/mobile/top-10-signs-of-cell-phone-addiction/). Then consider that Nielsen polling data for Western nations show people under 35 spend many more hours online than they do watching television (cfr. ). One may also note how the new media have served as the catalysts for phenomena in the public sphere, such as the "Manifestation de la Honte" in Belgium and the "Jasmine Revolution" in Tunisia.

These events indicate that radio broadcasting services cannot fail to take into consideration the emergence of a series of other technological instruments, from the podcast to the iPad, from social networks like Facebook, to micro-blogging platforms like Twitter. The new means of communication are to be thought of as interlocutors, not as competitors. Radio should look on new media as an opportunity, not as a threat. Herein lies the spirit of "convergence" among media, to which the Holy Father pointed in his Discourse to Managers and Employees of the Vatican Television Center, 18 December 2008.

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Commenting on the way that the boundaries between the various media are fading and how, at the same time, their synergies are increasing, Benedict XVI expressed himself in the following terms: [T]oday the Internet requires an ever increasing integration of written, audial and visual communication, and thus is a challenge to broaden and intensify the forms of collaboration between the media which are at the service of the Holy See."

To succeed in this task, it will be necessary to think outside the box: to see radio, television, internet and newspapers not as free-standing tools with well-defined competences, but rather as circles to intersect and link together. For Vatican Radio, such a convergence will have a first beneficial effect on the economic level: the use of new technologies, in fact, allows for a maximization of productivity. I am aware of how difficult it is to speak of these things, and I am also well aware of how much Vatican Radio has been able to do, compared with competitors both public and private.

Certainly, an integrated information process is already underway at Vatican Radio, one that foresees the use of new media and all they have to offer. The new means of communication, intelligently employed and wisely integrated into existing structures, can be important vehicles for the transmission of the Radio's message, guaranteeing an extremely wide diffusion at an extremely low cost. One need only think of how hubs or web streaming permit a much more rapid and certainly more widespread distribution of information, at a much more measured cost. The principal reason that must push Vatican Radio to embrace new tools and technologies, however, is to be found neither exclusively nor even principally in the economic efficiency that they promise.

The phenomenon of the convergence of classic media with new media - specifically, though not uniquely, the confluence of radio and internet - is to be thought of as the inevitable transformation that will give birth to a new specific role of radio service, in the context of a completely transformed system of information.

We are not talking about taking away radio's proper function: reaching listeners. Rather we are talking about using new media to render radio capable of meeting the expectations of listeners who are more and more sensitive to information. I think a new concept of radio is being born. This arises from three considerations. The first is that radio is more flexible than other media, and can find distribution platforms very easily. The second is that radio is a pervasive, though not intrusive, medium: unlike a picture, the voice surrounds and immerses the listener in an environment of sound, without imposing itself on the listener's space. The third is that the radio is an intimate, relational medium, a place for interiority, for responsibility, and not for the externals and appearances that pictures convey.

The convergence of radio and new media will not destroy the essence of radio. Rather, this convergence will strengthen radio communications. In the specific case of Vatican Radio, the convergence with new media will include two complementary processes. The first process concerns the harmonization of the work of Vatican Radio with other Vatican communications tools. The second process regards the relationship of the Holy See's radio station to other Catholic radio stations around the world.

The Vatican media outlets have undertaken the first process with determination: the areas of cooperation between the Vatican Television Center, the Pontifical Council for Social Communications and Vatican Radio are proof of this. Nevertheless, these developments are only the first stages of a larger, more broadly encompassing phenomenon able to establish the permanent presence of the Holy See in the world of new media....

...To evangelize means to address the difficulties to which the Church is subject. Vatican Radio must be the voice of the Church that contests those who say the Church is not capable of inner renewal, showing instead the tireless desire for purification expressed by Her Supreme Pastor. Vatican Radio needs to be the voice that promotes religious freedom in the world. Vatican Radio needs to be the voice that calls for dialogue and harmony in a world that turns increasingly to hatred and violence to solve conflicts.

All of us here know that the new media are absolutely essential, if Vatican Radio is to succeed in being such a voice. In this day, newswires, newspaper articles and even talk shows have given way to blogs, to the buzz and to going viral. Even before reaching the traditional media, a news item is worked over and modified, and new mechanisms shape and influence public opinion from the very beginning, in order either to make the news item important, world-wide, or to let it die and disappear.

It is no longer enough to go on air, to publish, to write. Today one needs to be present in the marketplaces, to update the web pages, in order to reach a world ever hungrier for news. In other words, not having new technical tools at one's full disposal, or not knowing about the most current tools, will mean that one's message will arrive late, will arrive wrong, and might even arrive in vain. In the aforementioned Message for the 45th World Communications Day, The Holy Father has reminded us how the new media: "[are] contributing to the development of new and more complex intellectual and spiritual horizons, new forms of shared awareness."

It is therefore essential for Vatican Radio to continue to adapt to these new tools if it wants to be the engine of new forms of consciousness, of awareness: in other words, of a new culture. Come to think of it, the development of a new culture based on a specific relationality is typical of the Church. Is not the Catholic Church the first global social network? Long before the new media existed, the Church's liturgical language, values, and way of thinking about the human person have bound together Catholics from around the world, whatever their culture, language, age, race or economic status. The globalization of the media cannot frighten us, because we were the phenomenon's first authors.

I conclude my speech to you, who spread the messages of the Holy Father, by repeating - as an expression of hope, as the driving force and core of your mission - the greeting that opens and closes all your services, and that throughout the whole world, like the notes of Christus vincit, identifies your station - our station: Laudetur Iesus Christus.

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