Shayne Looper: The Catholic Church and the media’s mea culpa

UNITED STATES
Wicked Local Cape Cod

By Shayne Looper
GateHouse News Service

Posted Feb 28, 2013

I am neither a Catholic nor the son of a Catholic (to misquote the prophet Amos), and I disagree with Rome on a wide array of ecclesiastical and theological issues. Yet here I am, rising to the defense of the Catholic Church in the face of media attacks that seem to me to be patently unjust.

The journalist Sheila Liaugminas attributes the recent spate of biased stories about Pope Benedict XVI and the Catholic Church to “lazy journalism and tendentious reporting.” She is being charitable. The slanted stories and offensive editorials are motivated by something darker: by a disrespect for the Church in general, for Catholics in particular and for conservative beliefs, in toto.

Consider the Feb. 15 Newsweek article by Tim Parks titled “Benedict’s Act of Grace” and subtitled “John Paul II left the church a mess.” There is a sense of disdain throughout the article. Rather than using papal names, the author repeatedly refers to John Paul II as Wojtyła and Gregory XVI as Ratzinger. He chooses inflammatory adjectives to describe the pontiffs: “reactionary,” “arch-conservative,” “interminably glamorous” (John Paul II) and “unimpressive” (Benedict XVI).

Michael Moynihan’s Newsweek column, “Good Riddance, Benedict! Why the pope was a moral failure,” is, if possible, even more disrespectful. The lead calls Benedict “the failed pontiff” and the article characterizes the 85-year-old ailing pope’s retirement as an abandonment of his post.

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