Ambassador of Ireland to Holy See
Frances Collins
Welcome message
Welcome to the website of the Embassy of Ireland to the Holy See.
It was a great honour and privilege to present credentials to His Holiness Pope Francis on 29 November 2022 and to be formally accredited as the eleventh Ambassador of Ireland to the Holy See.
The Holy See is based in the Vatican City State, which is itself an independent territory, created following the signature of the Lateran treaties in 1929. The Holy See is the central government of the Roman Catholic Church, which numbers 1.3 billion Catholics worldwide.
Ireland’s bilateral relationship with the Holy See is one the oldest in the history of the State. According to international laws and customs, the Holy See has a juridical personality which permits it to sign treaties and to send and receive diplomatic representatives, as juridical equivalent of a state. Indeed, the Holy See also plays an important role in many multilateral institutions, with observer status in a number of international organizations including the World Health Organization, the Council of Europe, and is active as permanent observer at the UN.
Ireland and the Holy See share longstanding foreign policy priorities such as climate change, human rights, sustainable development, eradicating hunger, nuclear disarmament, migration and human trafficking, freedom of religion or belief, and peaceful resolution of conflicts.
Both the Holy See and Ireland share a firm attachment to the multilateral system seeing multilateralism as central to addressing the many global challenges we face today. Much of the work of the Embassy is concerned with exchanging information and perspectives on some of these challenges so that both of us may contribute to their resolution more effectively.
Another key facet of our work is engagement with our religious diaspora community and enabling them to continue to connect with Ireland.
There are perhaps a hundred Irish religious living, studying or working in Rome. It has been a pleasure over the last months to meet with them and hear about their inspirational work not just here in Rome but through their missionary networks worldwide.
I hope that you find this website and the links it contains informative and do please contact us at the Embassy if you have any queries.
We also have an X (formerly Twitter) account to keep you updated so please follow us @IrlEmbHolySee
Le gach dea-ghuí / with best wishes,
Frances Collins
Ambassador