DIPLO - The Vatican’s diplomacy is an unlikely power - Published on 04 December 2025 Related topics: Religious diplomacy Vatican diplomacy Author: Diplo Team

DIPLO

The Vatican’s diplomacy is an unlikely power

Published on 04 December 2025

Related topics:    Religious diplomacy Vatican diplomacy

Author:   Diplo Team

Contents

Holy See vs. Vatican City

Influence based on soft power

A necessary critique of moral authority

A broker super partes

The challenge of moral doctrine vs. political reality

AI and multilateralism

The persistence of an idea

If you think about the diplomacy of the Holy See, the irony is almost theatrical. It brings up a delightfully old-fashioned question: how does a sovereign entity, a place barely larger than a decent-sized city park in London, manage to run one of the most extensive and durable diplomatic networks on the planet? It has no real army, just a ceremonial guard in those magnificent Renaissance uniforms, and its economy mainly relies on selling stamps and museum tickets.

The answer, as is often the case with complex topics, lies in important values that many of us may not think about often: convincing others with strong ethical arguments, remembering our history deeply, and having the kind of patience that only comes from being part of an organisation that looks at its existence over thousands of years rather than just the next election.

The image shows a map of the Vatican City

Holy See vs. Vatican City 

The temporal sovereignty of the Vatican City State is a geographical quirk. This tiny, 44-hectare sliver carved out of Rome in 1929 by the Lateran Treaty is really just the physical headquarters of the Holy See, which is the entity actually recognised under international law. Confusing the two is like confusing the paper deed with the inheritance itself, a basic mistake for any aspiring diplomat.

The Holy See is essentially the central government of the global Catholic Church. Its diplomatic corps, overseen by the Secretariat of State, has a mandate that is decidedly not secular: ensuring the freedom of the Church’s spiritual and charitable mission worldwide. This unique arrangement means the Papal Nuncio, their ambassador, has a dual role, often wearing both his scarlet biretta (a traditional church hat) and his standard diplomatic attire. His primary role isn’t only to negotiate deals with the host country, but to cater for the well-being of the local Catholic Church, making sure bishops are appointed, properties are secure, and schools and hospitals can operate freely.

Influence based on soft power 

The Nuncio essentially acts as a quiet, omnipresent guardian, caring for the local faithful while formally engaging with the state. The sheer scope of this network is genuinely surprising; the Holy See maintains formal diplomatic relations with over 180 countries, affording it a global reach comparable to that of any major superpower. Yet, its influence stems from the very fact that it asks for nothing territorial and isn’t shackled by a domestic national interest. Its ‘national’ interest is simply the Universal Common Good.

The image shows the Archbishop Bernardito Auza with the text Congratulations on your appointment as Apostolic Nuncio to the European Union.

On March 22, 2025, Pope Francis appointed Archbishop Bernardito Auza as Apostolic Nuncio to the European Union.

Sure, this lack of economic sanctions or military threats has drawbacks. A Nuncio’s primary tools are quiet conversation, carefully written encyclicals, and persistent intervention, what academics neatly call ‘soft power‘. But calling it merely ‘soft’ misses the solid weight of its inherent moral authority. When Pope Francis speaks out on climate change or the plight of refugees, it resonates with the deep loyalty of over a billion followers, a cultural and spiritual network that extends into every corner of the world and every struggling village. This massive, non-coercive foundation is precisely what allows the Holy See to maintain its greatest strategic advantage: neutrality.

A necessary critique of moral authority 

However, the reliance on ‘moral persuasion’ is frequently lauded as a strength, yet this perspective overlooks significant limitations. By confronting political reality, the Holy See, the governing body of the Catholic Church, has to engage in practical compromises to protect its own interests rather than sticking to strong moral principles.

This tension is most palpable in times of war. In the Russia-Ukraine conflict, the Vatican faced intense backlash for maintaining neutrality and initially avoiding the direct naming of Russia as the aggressor. To many Eastern European Catholics, this refusal to explicitly condemn the invader felt like a betrayal of the Church’s moral authority in favour of a diplomatic long game. This mirrors historical controversies, such as the intense scrutiny over Pope Pius XII’s silence during the Holocaust, a stance branded by early critics as complicity, or the muted criticism of Latin American regimes like Daniel Ortega’s in Nicaragua, where the Church was accused of being too complacent.

Furthermore, the Vatican’s ‘soft power’ can appear to be selectively applied. While the Holy See champions human rights regarding migration and trafficking, it faces scrutiny for its stance on gender rights and LGBTQ+ issues, which some view as inconsistent with a modern, universal human rights platform.

Even the defence of persecuted minorities has limits; human rights groups heavily criticised Pope Francis for avoiding the term ‘Rohingya‘ during his 2017 visit to Myanmar on the advice of local clergy. This choice highlighted the painful, ongoing friction between prophetic witness and cautious pragmatism, leaving many to question whether the Vatican’s unique ‘moral force’ is compromised by its engagement in a ‘realist’ world.

A broker super partes 

Despite these valid critiques, in our current era of hyper-partisanship, the Holy See consistently aims to position itself as super partes, above the political fray. This commitment to principled neutrality is, naturally, a tricky tightrope walk. History shows us instances of the Vatican making diplomatic missteps, with complex silences and fraught compromises, but it also reveals moments of spectacular, quiet victory.

For example, the Holy See’s diplomacy helped resolve the Beagle Channel dispute between Argentina and Chile in the 1980s. More recently, the Vatican was crucial in the slow, difficult, but ultimately successful thaw between the United States and Cuba. Cardinal Jaime Ortega’s patient, behind-the-scenes work was a powerful testament to a broker whose primary currency is trust, not leverage.

Following the 2022 invasion of Ukraine, Pope Francis appointed Cardinal Matteo Zuppi to lead peace missions to various capitals. These missions aimed not to impose terms, but to facilitate humanitarian actions, like the repatriation of Ukrainian children deported to Russia. Similarly, the Pope has been a persistent voice calling for a humanitarian ceasefire in the Gaza conflict, emphasising human dignity and maintaining open lines of communication with all major parties.

The challenge of moral doctrine vs. political reality 

The greatest challenge for papal diplomacy is the constant struggle to balance its moral doctrine with the harsh realities of politics. This internal tension is especially sharp when dealing with difficult regimes, most notably in the controversial provisional agreement with China regarding the appointment of bishops.

The image shows the front page of a book by Joseph Cardinal Zen, entitled For the Love of my People I will not Remain Silent: On the Situation of the Church in China.

This 2018 deal is perhaps the most heavily criticised aspect of modern Vatican diplomacy. Critics, including the outspoken Cardinal Joseph Zen of Hong Kong, argue the secret deal is a ‘betrayal’ that hands control over the local Catholic community to the Chinese Communist Party and its state-controlled Patriotic Association. The fear is that the Vatican is lending diplomatic legitimacy to an authoritarian government in exchange for minimal religious freedom, terms that Beijing frequently ignores by unilaterally appointing bishops.

The fact that the agreement’s details remain shrouded in secrecy has only fueled suspicion, drawing sharp rebuke from international figures such as former U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. Here, the practical need to ensure the lives and faith of millions of Chinese Catholics butts heads directly with the doctrinal necessity of the Pope’s ultimate authority. It is a high-stakes gamble in which the typical diplomatic toolkit is useless, leading to a compromise that is neither a total win nor a total capitulation.

AI and multilateralism 

The Church’s dedication to working with many nations (multilateralism) is another interesting feature. Unlike some national governments, the Vatican has never shown an interest in retreating behind its walls. It’s a permanent observer at the United Nations and a member of countless international bodies, from the World Health Organisation to the World Trade Organisation.

This presence ensures that whenever the conversation turns to ethics, bioethics, migration, or, increasingly, the morality of Artificial Intelligence, a spiritual perspective isn’t just present, but formally recorded. This isn’t crude lobbying; it’s a sustained moral witness, a decades-long effort to inject humanistic values into the often-cynical machinery of global governance. A key modern front is bioethics and technology: the Vatican has been a global leader in calling for algorithmic ethics, leading the Rome Call for AI Ethics, an international pledge that promotes transparency and responsibility in Artificial Intelligence development, pushing its spiritual mandate into the newest digital frontiers.

The final frontier for the Holy See is the digital public square, the shifting domain of cyber diplomacy. In the 21st century, the Papal Nunciature isn’t just a lovely building; it’s a fibre-optic cable and a secure, encrypted channel. The challenges facing diplomats today, such as disinformation, algorithmic warfare, and the fragmentation of communities by digital echo chambers, all fall squarely within the Holy See’s concern for human dignity. After all, what is a disinformation campaign if not an electronic assault on the truth, which the Church claims, by its very nature, to uphold? The Vatican’s presence in digital governance is not a fashionable trend but a logical expansion of its most ancient mandate. The moral compass needs adjustment for the virtual terrain, but the principles, they would argue, remain timeless.

The persistence of an idea 

The story of Vatican diplomacy is ultimately about persistence and longevity. It shows that, even in an age dominated by sheer data and firepower, there is an important, though often overlooked, place for the sacred in the secular. It’s a spectacle of influence achieved not through force but through conscience, proving the strange, slow, and sometimes wholly effective power of trying to be right, for an incredibly long time. It is, in short, a high-wire act performed not for applause, but for peace and the core values of humanity.