VATICAN CITY — The Vatican, whose communications problems are no secret, is taking a leap into the world of new media next week with the launch of a news information portal that Pope Benedict XVI himself might put online with a papal click.

Vatican officials said Saturday that Benedict has been following the development of the portal, which will for the first time aggregate information from the Vatican’s various print, online, radio and television media in a one-stop-shop for Holy See news.

The portal — www.news.va — is being launched Wednesday, the 60th anniversary of Benedict’s ordination as a priest and a feast day in the church.

Monsignor Claudio Maria Celli, who heads the Vatican office that developed the portal and will maintain it, said Benedict might put the site online himself with a click from the Apostolic Palace.

It’s the latest step for the Vatican to bring its evangelizing message to a greater, Internet-savvy audience and follows its forays into Facebook, Twitter and YouTube.

It’s also a significant step for the 84-year-old Benedict, who has been bedeviled by communications woes during much of his six-year papacy.

While the portal is designed mostly to provide Vatican news in an easy-to-use setting for the outside world, Celli said he hoped it would also improve the Vatican’s own internal communications by letting various departments know what one another are up to and help provide a more coherent message to the outside world.