LDS church announces Spanish speaking newsroom
In a landmark announcement indicating the growth of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Spanish-speaking countries, the church has unveiled a new Spanish-speaking news page.
The news page consolidates the global faith’s 18 newsrooms from Latin America, providing a unified experience in sharing information with Spanish speakers around the world, according to a church statement.
The website — noticias.laiglesiadejesucristo.org — publishes news articles about the church for the general public (including Latter-day Saints) and is the official church news source for news media organizations. With the consolidation of the Spanish sites, there are now 65 additional sites in 28 languages generating local content, according to the church.
In coming days, the page will include a section showcasing news of special interest to Latter-day Saints. The existing country-specific Church Newsroom pages in Spanish will be redirected to the new Spanish-language news page, the press release said.
“As part of this new website, we have incorporated technology that detects a person’s location upon visiting the website, so the experience they have while navigating the page is local and feels familiar to a Mexican, Peruvian, Dominican, Guatemalan or whichever country they’re connecting from. This means that people will see prioritized content from their country according to the detected location,” said David Parra, of the church’s Information and Communication Services Department.
Once on the site, users will have the ability to select additional country options from a drop-down menu and choose specific location content they wish to experience, which “will give the audience total autonomy to control what they want to see, according to their interests.”
Elder Ronald A. Rasband of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles chairs the Church Communications Committee and said the consolidation helps to more effectively share the messages of the gospel of Jesus Christ while allowing areas to highlight local activities and priorities, according to the church statement.
“This follows direction given by church President Russell M. Nelson,” Rasband said. “More than one-third of our membership speaks Spanish as their first language, and having a consolidated channel to distribute news of the church aligns well with the First Presidency’s desire to simplify the tools that we use. It helps us to better communicate with one voice.”
An editorial governance committee, comprised of Church Communications Department representatives from different areas in Latin America, plans, produces and publishes the channel’s content. The church is continuing to effort a similar newsroom consolidation strategy for other languages and countries in various regions throughout the world, where practical, the press release said.
Newsroom is comprised of a global Church Newsroom in English that was created in early 2000. The English-language website publishes news of interest to the general public (which includes a significant Latter-day Saint audience), journalists and friends of the faith. The channel is administrated by the Church Communications Department at Church Headquarters in Salt Lake City.
With the consolidation of the Spanish sites, there are now 65 additional sites in 28 languages generating local content.