Twelve Villanova interns work in and around the Vatican. What’s it like to work with the pope?
Villanova’s intern program at the Vatican started in 2003 after the Internet Office of the Holy See told some Villanova alumni it needed computer programming help.
Finley Doherty walked the papal retreat grounds on Tuesday, interviewing those who were there for the awarding of Villanova University’s inaugural sustainability medal. She also recorded the ceremony.
It was all part of her work as one of 12 Villanova students who are interning this semester in offices and news agencies in and around the Vatican.
Doherty, 21, a junior communications major, is working for the communications department of the General Curia of the Order of Saint Augustine, the central governing body of the Augustinian Order, which is just outside the Vatican walls. Doherty, who is Catholic, was excited to get a study-abroad experience that also allowed her to work in her faith.
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“I help out with their social media coordinating, as well as with their website,” said Doherty, who is from Hopkinton, Mass. “Recently, a fun thing I’ve been doing is interviewing people within the Curia and then taking a part of the interview that I think maybe will resonate with people regardless of their faith or their background and posting it on social media.”
Villanova’s intern program at the Vatican started in 2003 after the Internet Office of the Holy See told some Villanova alumni it needed computer programming help. The school sent computer science majors to assist. In 2005, the program was opened to communications majors, and the relationship with the Pontifical Council for Social Communications — the Vatican’s social media arm — began in 2008. More than 150 students have participated in the program over the two decades since its launch.
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Interns in 2009 filmed a virtual tour of the Sistine Chapel, even moving inside the small area where the ballots are counted in the election of a new pope — a space normally roped off to the public. They have also done virtual tours of the Basilica of St. John Lateran, the Basilica of St. Peter, and the Redemptoris Mater Chapel, used exclusively by the pope for prayer and special Masses for small groups.
» READ MORE: Villanova creates virtual tour of chapel used exclusively by the pope
Over the years, Villanova interns helped start the pope’s official Twitter presence and have ferreted out impostor accounts. When the Vatican launched its pope channel on YouTube, it was a Villanova intern who proposed advertising it on Facebook.
And in May 2025, when Robert Prevost was elected the next pope, Villanova interns were on the ground, watching.
Doherty, who has been interning in Rome since August and will finish in December, would have liked to see Pope Leo XIV present Villanova’s sustainability medal, but he had to have surgery on Tuesday for what was later revealed to be lung cancer.
As a Vatican program intern, Doherty has already been close to the Holy Father. She sat on the front platform about 10 rows back from the pope during one of his general audiences. She filmed the pope and posted clips.
“Every day, I just feel so lucky,” she said.
