Pope Francis has appointed Helen Osman as a consultant to the Vatican's Dicastery for Communication.
A dicastery is essentially a department within the Vatican.
Osman is the current Diocese of Jefferson City director of diocesan communications.
"It's a volunteer appointment," Osman said about the appointment. "They look around the world and see who they would like to have be available to them. It's like an advisory board. I'm supposed to go for the first meeting in November."
The Most Rev. W. Shawn McKnight, bishop of the Diocese of Jefferson City, announced the appointment Thursday morning.
The dicastery is the first Vatican office to be led by a lay person, Paolo Ruffini. It oversees all aspects of communications for the Vatican, including radio, print, television and digital platforms, such as the Pope's Twitter account @pontifex.
Osman was one of 10 people recently appointed as consultants for the dicastery. She is the only laywoman among appointments. Appointments included three laymen, one of them an American from Massachusetts.
Osman grew up in the Diocese of Jefferson City and currently resides in Austin, Texas. She served as the communications director for the Diocese of Austin for more than two decades before she was named the chief communications officer for the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops and later led communications for the Diocese of Jefferson City. In September, she was elected to a second term as president of SIGNIS, the only global association of Catholic communicators with canonical statutes.
"On behalf of the Diocese of Jefferson City, I congratulate Helen on this appointment," Bishop McKnight said. "I ask all to please join me in prayer as she begins this important new role and continues her service to our diocese."
Vatican laws say the consultants gather at least once every two years, Osman said. It is up to Ruffini to determine how often.
She said the Vatican has had a push of late to be certain people in appointments are turned over regularly. Osman said the Vatican surprised her with the appointment letter when she went to Rome for a SIGNIS meeting last week.
"(The Vatican is) using this opportunity to use consultants to be of greater service to the church worldwide," Osman said. "They're the communications office for the Holy See. They have a function of serving the whole church. It's been a function of the Vatican offices for -- I don't know how long -- as long as I've been serving in Church communications."