Leo XIV Names First Woman to Lead Vatican Communications
On the papal plane, he praised her creativity and liveliness as she assumes leadership of a dicastery long criticized for budget, speed, and missionary clarity.
On Friday, November 6, 2026, aboard the papal plane, Pope Leo XIV introduced María Montserrat Alvarado as the new prefect of the Dicastery for Communications. He praised her experience, creativity, and “liveliness.” She assumed the post on November 1, succeeding Paolo Ruffini, and is the first woman to lead the office—one of the largest and most costly parts of the Holy See’s bureaucracy.
The dicastery has long drawn criticism from Vatican financial officials over its budget and staffing levels, and from journalists who say it is too slow to answer requests for information, if it answers at all. Vatican communications has often been shaped by a secretive and defensive culture in which the public’s right to know is scarcely acknowledged. Leo has said he wants Church and Holy See communication to proceed from an “explicitly missionary perspective,” and indicated that Alvarado’s arrival would address some of the “challenging” concerns facing the department.
A closer voice for the Pope
At her inaugural press conference that week, held with Holy See Press Office director Matteo Bruni ahead of Leo’s three-nation tour of Latin America, Alvarado spoke for the Pope. Of his return to Peru she said: “Certainly the homecoming piece is very important to him. He feels that very deeply.” She relayed a message in which Leo hoped the media would help show the world how the diversity of the Latin American Church can be a force for healing and peace—a degree of proximity to the Pope that Vatican spokespeople have not often enjoyed since the era of Joaquín Navarro-Valls.
A casual remark that Leo would eventually go to Mexico briefly caught some Spanish-language outlets off guard, after the Vatican foreign minister had already said as much the previous week.
From EWTN to the Holy See
Born in Mexico City, Alvarado led EWTN News from 2023 and joined the network as a news anchor in 2021, after earlier work at the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty. In an interview she said Leo chose her because “we are in a moment where digital communications and traditional communications are coming together,” adding: “In no way am I imposing a vision. I’m very much receiving one and executing it.”
The dicastery oversees the Vatican press office, television, radio, online platforms, publishing, photographic services, and newspaper operations, including the print afternoon edition of L'Osservatore Romano. Her appointment places a laywoman with deep experience in Catholic media at the head of the Holy See’s central communications apparatus as the Pope seeks a more missionary tone.