VATICAN CITY — The newspaper industry might be on the ropes, but one staid broadsheet is getting a makeover at the behest of a lofty patron: Pope Benedict XVI.
In its 147 years as the Vatican’s newspaper of record, L’Osservatore Romano has rarely chased advertisers, or even news. Hard to find beyond the world’s smallest state, the Vatican’s daily paper largely dedicated its pages to theological monologues with headlines like “The Leprosy of Sin.”
Those days are over. Now, the Vatican mouthpiece has orders to carry hard-hitting news, international stories and more articles by women.
The Vatican’s newspaper of record, L’Osservatore Romano, has been undergoing a makeover at the behest of Pope Benedict XVI.
“There was a really precise request from the paper’s publisher,” Giovanni Maria Vian, the paper’s new editor in chief, said in a recent interview at his office within the medieval walls of Vatican City. “In this case, the publisher just happened to be the pope.”
To read the rest of Davide Berretta’s article in The Wall Street Journal visit this link.