Jacques Dessaucy passed away in April 2025 in Libramont, Belgium. A Belgian journalist and he was a prominent figure in Catholic journalism and audiovisual media.
In 1954, while still a student, he founded Télépro, one of the very first weekly television magazines in Belgium. After becoming a deacon, he continued to contribute actively to the publication, which was later integrated into the Belgian Catholic press. He also held an official press card issued by the Belgian government.
In 1977, Jacques joined the international Catholic organization for radio and television UNDA in Brussels—located, like OCIC, on Rue de l’Orme—where he became assistant to Secretary General Fr. Colm Murphy (1930–2019). He later served as editor-in-chief of various publications, including the Unda Newsletter. Deeply passionate about the evolution of media and communication, Jacques kept a close watch on emerging trends. He published regularly on these topics and often engaged in long discussions with his colleague Robert Molhant (1940-2016), particularly following Molhant’s and Paul Guillet’s of the OCIC missionary service Rome return from the NAB Conference in Las Vegas—whose motto was Where Media Moves Next. Insights from these conferences frequently appeared in Jacques’ articles.
In 1978, working in collaboration with OCIC, Jacques helped launch the Educommunication project, adopted that same year as part of the International Year of the Child. In 1980, together with Abot. Armand Pirard, he founded the Catholic Television Documentation Center (CTV), which aimed to promote media literacy.
In 1992, Jacques left UNDA to join OCIC, where he was responsible for organizing Catholic video distribution. Since 1977, he had also been actively involved in organizing the joint world congresses of UNDA and OCIC, becoming a well-known and familiar face among their members. He officially stepped down from his roles in 2001 with the creation of SIGNIS.