Vatican news with institutional memory.
Inside The Vatican follows Pope Leo, Vatican officials, and Catholic debates with patient institutional context. Its strength is turning dense church news, from Iran-war statements to women’s leadership reports, into clear moral and historical analysis.
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Inside The Vatican is built for listeners who want Vatican news with memory. The show does not rush from one Catholic headline to the next. It pauses over context, asks what an event means, and keeps returning to the institutional history behind today’s decisions. Pope Leo’s early pontificate gives the recent episodes a strong center of gravity. His visits to places such as Algeria, Cameroon, and Monaco become occasions to examine peace, justice, interreligious encounter, corruption, and the moral language of papal diplomacy. The show can be grave when the subject demands it. Episodes on Iran and just-war reasoning weigh statements from Pope Leo and U.S. cardinals against Catholic criteria for legitimate force, right intention, last resort, and the pursuit of peace. That seriousness also appears in discussions of church governance. The roundtable on women’s leadership follows Study Group 5, the Synod on Synodality, women’s ministries, and the female diaconate without flattening the tensions involved. Other episodes turn inward toward Vatican procedure and authority. Coverage of the Society of St. Pius X tracks dialogue, rejection, ordinations, and the question of unity with a careful sense of ecclesial consequence. Conclave episodes add narrative force. Reporting around the election of Pope Leo XIV treats the secrecy of the process, the religious experience of the cardinals, and the symbolic weight of a first American pope as connected questions rather than separate curiosities. The show also has a practical newsroom rhythm. Updates on the Apostolic Palace, Opus Dei, the Vatican trial of the century, new nuncios, papal addresses, and book-related reporting sit beside deeper analysis without losing the thread. Its style is calm and clarifying. The listener hears Vatican affairs explained by people who expect the details to matter, but who still translate offices, documents, and disputes into plain terms. Inside The Vatican is not casual Catholic commentary. It is a disciplined guide to how the Vatican acts, speaks, waits, and signals in a turbulent world.
Made for: For Catholics, religion journalists, church watchers, and globally minded listeners who want Vatican developments explained with patience and context. It especially suits people interested in papal diplomacy, Catholic moral reasoning, and internal Catholic governance.
What sets it apart: The show pairs close Vatican reporting with Catholic moral and historical framing, so papal gestures and official statements are treated as signals with consequences. It is strongest when connecting world events, church institutions, and the lived questions facing Catholics.
Each week, Colleen Dulle goes behind the headlines of the biggest Vatican news stories with America’s Rome correspondent Gerard O’Connell. They'll break down complicated news stories that have a whole lot of history behind them in an understandable, engaging way. Colleen and Gerard will give you the inside scoop on what people inside the Vatican are thinking, saying—and planning.
Based on 6 episodes we listened to · September 2026
It makes Vatican decisions legible by pairing precise questions with historical context, theological distinctions and close attention to institutional authority.
Inside The Vatican turns institutional Catholic news into a working conversation between Colleen Dulle and veteran Vatican correspondent Gerard O'Connell. Dulle presses for definitions and consequences; O'Connell supplies historical context from Rome.
Rome calls, New Orleans answers: you get the Vatican story after the headline stops behaving.
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Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
A measured Catholic examination of whether the Iran war meets Cardinal McElroy's just-war tests.
Inside The Vatican frames the Iran war as a test of Catholic moral reasoning, not as a slogan to be endorsed or rejected. Colleen Dilley and veteran Vatican correspondent Gerard O'Connell move through Cardinal McElroy's just-war requirements: legitimate authority, right…
A measured guide to SSPX's latest Vatican standoff and the Church questions behind it.
Inside The Vatican uses SSPX's latest standoff with the Vatican to open up a broader Catholic argument about communion, authority, and what remains unsettled when a traditionalist society rejects much of Vatican II.
A Rome-grounded episode connects Pope Leo's Lenten message to Gaza, Ukraine, prayer, and war's public-health damage.
Ash Wednesday in Rome gives this episode a clear frame: Pope Leo's Lenten message, Vatican diplomacy, and the moral language used around war. Ricardo da Silva and Gerardo Connell explain why the Vatican will not join the Board for Peace sought by President Trump for the…
A measured Vatican conversation on keeping human judgment central as AI moves deeper into public life.
Artificial intelligence reaches the Vatican here as a test of human judgment, not just technical capacity. The discussion of Antiqua et Nova centers on a clear distinction: AI may process data with impressive speed, but it cannot decide which questions deserve asking, especially…
A cheerful papal university visit quickly gives way to a public rebuke over women in the church.
A papal trip to Belgium and Luxembourg turns into a study of how fast a church visit can shift its meaning. In a university hall outside Brussels, Pope Francis comes across as buoyant during a session described as positive and cheerful.
Islamic argument in the public square.
Survivor stories after religious exile.
Inside the Vatican with America Media discusses the Vatican's January 28 document Antiqua et Nova, which says human intelligence cannot be replaced by artificial intelligence and that AI must serve the common good.
Pope Francis faced criticism in Belgium over clergy sexual abuse and the church's treatment of women, including a university statement calling his views 'deterministic and reductive.' The Vatican suspended 10 members of the Peruvian lay group Sodalitium Christiane Vitae for abuses, including a bishop and journalist Alejandro Bermudez.
Pope Leo XIV gives his first interview, discussing his 70th birthday celebrations and the presentation of credentials by the new U.S.
A roundtable discussion on the death of Pope Francis and his nearly 13-year papacy.
A roundtable discussion on the Pope's comments about Trump, with updates from Jerry's reporting on the Pope's Africa trip.
This episode of Inside the Vatican covers Pope Leo's condemnation of Trump's Iran threat as unacceptable, along with other Vatican news.
A roundtable discussion among Catholic journalists analyzing the Vatican's report on women's participation in church leadership, focusing on the history and implications of Study Group 5.
Authors discuss their new book on the secret election of Pope Leo XIV, the first American pope, and why cardinals broke their oath of secrecy.
This episode of Inside the Vatican discusses Pope Leo's multifaceted efforts to advocate for peace, particularly regarding the war in Iran, and covers other Vatican news.
Inside The Vatican focuses on U.S.
Co-hosts discuss Gerard O'Connell's new book on the election of Pope Leo XIV and his wife's war reporting from Israel.
Gerard O'Connell says Pope Leo's upcoming trips include Monaco on March 28, an April 13-23 Africa tour, and Spain from June 6-12, with stops in Barcelona, the Canary Islands, and later Lampedusa on July 4.
On Inside the Vatican, Ricardo da Silva and Gerard O'Connell report from Rome on Ash Wednesday that Cardinal Pietro Parolin confirmed the Vatican will not join President Trump's proposed Board for Peace for rebuilding Gaza, citing the exclusion of Palestinians and concerns about bypassing the United Nations.
On Inside the Vatican, host Colleen Dulley and Vatican correspondent Gerard O'Connell are joined by John Thavis, former Rome bureau chief of Catholic News Service, to trace the Vatican's 55-year relationship with the Society of St.
Pope Leo XIV gives his first interview, discussing his 70th birthday celebrations and the presentation of credentials by the new U.S.
Hosts Colleen Dully and Gerard O'Connell discuss Pope Leo XIV's warm address to Vatican employees and his emerging model of the papacy, along with Vatican news updates.