1930s , his successor
Cardinal Pacelli with
Guglielmo Marconi at the starting of
Vatican Radio in
1931 at Vatican City (2018) Vatican Radio began broadcasting with the callsign HVJ on two shortwave frequencies using 10
kilowatts (kW) of power on 12 February 1931, with the pontificial message "Omni creaturae" of
Pope Pius XI. Also in attendance was
Guglielmo Marconi and Cardinal Eugenio Pacelli, who would become
Pope Pius XII. During
World War II, Vatican Radio's news broadcasts were (like all foreign broadcasts) banned in Germany. During the war, the radio service operated in four languages. While some critics have said Pope Pius XII was too quiet regarding the Holocaust, Jacques Adler examined the transcripts of wartime broadcasts over the Vatican Radio. Adler argues that it exposed Nazi persecution of the Church and opposed collaboration with Nazism. It appealed to Catholics to remain true to their faith's injunctions: to defend the sanctity of life and the unity of humankind. In so doing the Pope pursued a policy of spiritual resistance to Nazi ideology and racism.
1940s and 1950s In 1948, services expanded to 18 languages. Due to space constraints, the
Holy See acquired a 400-
hectare (1½ sq. mi.) area located 18 kilometres (11 miles) north of
Rome at
Santa Maria di Galeria (GC: ). The
Italian Republic granted the site extraterritorial status in 1952. Vatican Radio stopped transmitting short- and medium-wave broadcasts to
North America,
South America, and
Europe on Sunday 1 July 2012. The
Vatican Press Office closed
Vatican Information Service in August 2012. In 2014 Michael Gannon, from Ireland, became the first person with Down Syndrome to work at any Vatican office, which he did as an intern at Vatican Radio. As of 2016, Vatican Radio had a staff of 355 people who produce more than 66 hours of daily programming in 45 languages on air, and 38 languages on the website. Programs are broadcast via short wave, FM and satellite. Vatican Radio has been losing between €20 and €30 million annually. With its absorption into the Curia's Secretariat for Communications on 1 January 2017 Vatican Radio director Msgr.
Dario Viganò has indicated that he plans to pare down short-wave radio operations and institute cost control measures in the service's other broadcast operations. On 24 March 2017, Vatican Radio made its final English-language shortwave transmission to
Asia after 59 years of service. Vatican Radio's English Service for Asia has then continued online. ==Television and satellite==