Sr. Janet Fearns

As I write this, I’m expecting a visit from the Pope. Not that he’s coming to see me in person, but it sounds good to say that I’m expecting his visit. In actual fact he’s coming to Vatican Radio in order to wish us a happy 75th Birthday. We have also had a congratulatory e-mail from Cardinal Cormac Murphy O’Connor plus a box of Baci chocolates from one of the American Cardinals. (‘Baci’ means ‘kiss’ in Italian and the Baci chocolates are really delicious.)

It’s been fascinating watching the preparations for the Pope’s visit. Suddenly the new studios, meant to have been completed in November and then December 18th, WILL be finished by the time the Holy Father sees them. (The new equipment won’t yet have been completely connected, but it will look good!) Dingy-looking corridors are now gleaming with their new coats of white paint. An army of cleaners is scrubbing corners that were already quite clean. Marble floors and staircases to be used by the pope are suddenly shining like mirrors. (Those where he won’t be going are in their normal non-shine condition.)

The Vatican Radio employees are also thinking in terms of personal appearance for the occasion. More than one jacket has found its way from an owner to a prospective wearer who needs something to go with a particular skirt or pair of trousers. I’ve overheard several people asking what someone is planning to wear on Friday. We’ve been given a detailed itinerary for the visit, so it’s pretty clear that Pope Benedict will come up to us on the fourth floor first, but will make his initial pause to bless the studio where Bishop, then Archbishop, then Cardinal Wojtiwa was interviewed on several occasions. I’m not too sure how the next bit of magic is worked, because I don’t see how, knowing the geography of the place, the Pope will come to greet the English, South Asia and English-Africa Programmes without crossing through the Ethiopian Programme, which is supposed to be the stop afterwards. Fortunately I don’t have to work out the logistics. I will only need to be in the right place at the right time.

The whole visit is scheduled to take 1hour 15minutes, which I think will be a major feat even for someone as efficient and systematic as Pope Benedict. With several hundred Vatican Radio personnel to meet and 46 photographic opportunities, he will probably need to be in several places at once. I also presume that he will arrive by car, which he might regret. It’s only a few minutes’ walk between the Vatican and Vatican Radio, a walk that is very pleasant in good weather. However, as Pope, his time and means of travel is no longer directed by personal whim.

By the time you read this, the Holy Father will have already visited and left ‘his’ radio, but the memories will live on…as do the first broadcasts made by Pope Pius XI on 12th February 1931, the denunciations of the Nazis by Pope Pius XII, the approximate 2,500,000 messages between members of divided families as they tried to reunite after the Second World War, the struggles of the Eastern European Programmes during the Cold War to keep the spark of hope alive in their homelands. Never to be forgotten are the transmissions keeping the world up-to-date with the events of the Second Vatican Council, the deaths of Popes Pius XII, John XXIII, Paul VI, John Paul I and John Paul II, heralding the elections of their successors. Every so often someone will remember that Vatican Radio tries to reach the ends of the earth through its broadcasts and that, having celebrated its 75th birthday, we now start to look towards whatever means of communication will be around 25 years from now.

Ad multos annos!