Indonesian Becomes Official Language of Vatican News
REPUBLIKA.CO.ID, VATICAN – Indonesia has become the first country from Southeast Asia to designate its national language as an official language on Vatican News. This follows a long diplomatic process that began in 2024.
“This moment is a historic event for the Indonesian nation, particularly for Catholics in Indonesia,” said the Ambassador of the Republic of Indonesia to the Holy See, Vatican, Michael Trias Kuncahyono, at the inauguration event for the cooperation on using Indonesian in Vatican News on 25 March 2026 in the Vatican.
The agreement, signed by the Chairman of the Social Communications Commission of the Indonesian Bishops’ Conference (KWI), Mgr Agustinus Tri Budi Utomo, and the Prefect of the Dicastery for Communication of the Holy See, Dr Paolo Ruffini, designates Indonesian as the 57th official language used on Vatican News.
Mgr Didik, who is also the Bishop of the Archdiocese of Surabaya, expressed hope that the cooperation between KWI and the Dicastery for Communication would serve as a channel of blessing, bringing glad tidings to all the faithful and the Indonesian people. “With this cooperation, Indonesians will now hear messages from the Pope and news from the Vatican directly in their mother tongue, Indonesian,” said Mgr Didik.
Vatican News is the official news portal of the Holy See, providing information on the Pope’s activities, the Holy See, particular churches, and space for world news. Together with Vatican Radio, L’Osservatore Romano (the Vatican’s daily newspaper), and Vatican Media, the portal communicates and interacts through audio, video, text, and images on a multilingual, multicultural, multi-channel, multimedia, and multi-device platform.
Meanwhile, Paolo Ruffini hopes that the use of Indonesian on Vatican News will bring Vatican news in an Indonesian context, making it easily accepted and understood by Indonesians.
Ruffini emphasised that the warm welcome and great enthusiasm from Indonesians during Pope Francis’s visit to Indonesia in 2024 provided the motivation to realise this cooperation.
According to Ruffini, this cooperation is a tangible manifestation of the diplomatic relations between Indonesia and the Holy See, which will have lasted 75 years in 2025. History records that the Holy See was the first European country to recognise Indonesia’s independence in 1947, by sending an Apostolic Delegation that provided support to the youth in Indonesia.
“Our dream is to create a platform where the Catholic community worldwide is fully connected, enabling them to share not only text, images, and audio in real-time, but also the living experiences of the Church, wherever they are,” stated Ruffini.