Historian examines wartime record of Vatican radio, newspaper under Pius XII

July 18, 2025

In its July 16 and July 17 editions, L’Osservatore Romano published a two-article series by Italian historian Sergio Favretto examining, in depth, the record of Vatican Radio and the Vatican newspaper during World War II, when Venerable Pius XII was pope.

The articles are entitled “Radio Vaticana e «L’Osservatore Romano» voci di libertà fra guerra e Shoah“ [Vatican Radio and L’Osservatore Romano: Voices of Freedom during War and the Shoah] and “Pio XII tra storia e memoria“ [Pius XII between history and memory].

“Vatican Radio was part of the multi-level network that Pius XII built to defend the freedom and autonomy of thought, society, and faith” and “to support opposition to the tragic and racially charged persecution of the Jews,” Favretto wrote in the second article.

Favretto also cited articles critical of Hitler’s Aryan ideology that appeared in L’Osservatore Romano della Domenica, at the time the Sunday Vatican newspaper.

 

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Further information:

• Radio Vaticana e «L’Osservatore Romano» voci di libertà fra guerra e Shoah (L'Osservatore Romano)
• Pio XII tra storia e memoria (L'Osservatore Romano)