Journeys of faith highlighted at Easter
‘Tis the season when thousands of people are making the final preparations to be received into the church at the Easter Vigil on Holy Saturday evening. Many Catholic publications are highlighting some of the journeys these new partners in faith have made.
For instance, the Catholic Explorer in the Diocese of Joliet, Ill., tells the story of a former evangelical minister who converted to the faith in 1999 and now has a traveling ministry as a motivational speaker. Or, check this story in The Catholic Spirit in St. Paul, Minn., about another recent convert “infecting” family and friends with her enthusiasm for the faith. The Catholic Sentinel in Portland, Ore., also had a roundup of some Oregon residents who will be newly initiated into the faith at Easter.
And for a first-person account of what it is like to walk on a journey of faith with 23 new Catholics, look at this story in St. Anthony Messenger magazine by a parish religious education director in California.
New sins? Hardly.
It’s always amusing to work in our newsroom on days like today when other news outlets are misinterpreting — or purposely hyping out of proportion — a story involving the church. Today’s case in point, if you have not heard, is the interview a Vatican official gave to the Vatican newspaper on the social impact of sin in a globalized society.
Among today’s headlines: “Vatican introduces more ways to sin“, “Seven More Sins, Thanks to Vatican“, “New sins as bad as the old sins — Vatican official“, “Vatican Updates Its Thou-Shalt-Not List“, and my personal favorite, “Recycle or go to Hell, warns Vatican.”
Granted, some of these are simply headline writers having fun (a “sin” many of us in the business can admit to). But it of course begs the question of whether there is a catalogue of sins someone can look up, besides the Ten Commandments or the seven deadly sins. (Not even the Catechism of the Catholic Church has an index of sins, though it does have a great index of subjects that it covers.)
The amusement is in the phone calls that come in on a day like today, like the call I took from one Catholic communications official trying to track down the story because she had heard from a local reporter who thought that the addition of new sins to the existing “list” was one of the biggest stories of the year, something akin to an addition to the list of crimes eligible for the death penalty.
And that’s also why we urge readers to check with us to get the unadulterated version of a story getting heavy play in the mainstream media — we add no artificial ingredients. (And if you’ve gone this far without reading how we reported this story, you can click on the link here.)
UPDATE: Another good summary on how this story was wrongly reported is on the blog of America magazine. And it reminds me of last fall’s rumor du jour, the allegation that Bibles were being banned for the Beijing Olympics.
Why Catholics leave (continued) …
More Catholic press reaction to the release late last month of the landmark study by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life on the religious affiliation of U.S. adults, this time from Our Sunday Visitor.  Editor John Norton wrote a column on one aspect of the study — the fact that Catholics are leaving the church “in droves” — and says in a second column that he was inundated with responses. One that he highlights was from a Michigan deacon who listed a variety of reasons Catholics leave, based on his pastoral experience. You can read those here.
Podcast explores new survey on religious practice
Speaking of National Catholic Reporter (see previous post), last week’s release of the landmark “U.S. Religious Landscape Survey,” conducted by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life, is the subject of a three-episode podcast (totalling about 15 minutes) posted this week by the newspaper.
What should the pope say in America?
At least two CNS clients are beginning to explore what Pope Benedict might say and what he might find during his U.S. trip., while a third blogs about those questions.
– The National Catholic Reporter published the first of what it says will be four essays leading up to the papal visit. In the first, professor Richard R. Gaillardetz imagines a different kind of papal visit from JPII’s trips, one that would be largely a fact-finding mission that would show that “the American religious scene is not the same as that in Western Europe.”
– The National Catholic Register blogged this week about the Gaillardetz piece and pointed to an earlier papal-visit preview piece by Catholic journalist Russell Shaw, who wants to give the pope “an honest picture of the real state of American Catholicism behind the ecclesiastical Potemkin Village façade that will be on display.”
– One of America magazine’s blogs is asking readers to weigh in on what the pope’s message to America should be. A sampling of responses, it says, will be published before the trip.
As we often say on the bottom of the first take of a breaking story, more to come …
Keeping up on the Catholic vote
How the Catholic vote plays out both in the Democratic primaries and this fall’s general election is something lots of news organizations (including us!) are following. And on that topic, our client America magazine had a great post this week on its blog calling Catholics “quintessential swing voters, pulled towards the Democrats on economic issues, pulled towards the GOP on social issues.”
What made this post particularly attractive to news and politics junkies like me were the links in it to an article on the Catholic vote at Politico.com and to, as the America blogger says, “a fascinating look at how the media and a campaign interact.” (If you’ve not heard of Politico, it’s a relatively new Web site and newspaper here in D.C. that has quickly become a major player in election coverage because of the strength of its reporting staff.)
It’s this kind of reporting by a respected magazine like America that proves how much the Internet has changed the media in the past dozen years. How long would an analysis like this have had to wait until it appeared in the print edition? How much more difficult would it have been to find these Politico articles — especially its “How the sausage gets made” piece on interaction between the media and the Obama campaign — without the Internet?
I know I’m stating the obvious, but finding this post on America’s blog (courtesy of my Google Reader) and the links that are in it was one of those “ah ha!” moments for me.
Meanwhile, remember 2004? We tracked the Catholic vote in that election too, an election which featured a Catholic nominee on the Democratic ticket. This fall’s election won’t have that angle (though there were numerous Catholics vying for attention when the election season began). But following the Catholic vote — both next month in Pennsylvania and in November — will still be a major issue to cover.
PHOTO: A man votes in the presidential primary at Christ the King Parish in Silver Spring, Md., Feb. 12. (CNS/Paul Haring)
Also worth noting …
From here and there around the Catholic press:
– Bishop’s secretary for 23 years says he does what needs to be done in service to the Lord. (Arlington Catholic Herald, Va.)
– Pastor who drowned recalled as brilliant, generous, open-minded, willing to grow. (Catholic Sentinel, Ore.)
– Bankruptcy court to mull release of more sex abuse documents. (Catholic Sentinel, Ore.)
– City parish takes aim at urban violence, one gun at a time. (The Catholic Review, Md.)
– Youth invited to enter video contest welcoming Pope Benedict. (Catholic Standard, D.C.)
– Schools raise $27,000 for victims of war in Uganda. (Intermountain Catholic, Utah)
– Salt Lake bishop’s latest podcast is reflection on purpose, history of Lent. (Intermountain Catholic, Utah)
New resources for preparing to welcome the pope
As excitement builds in the run-up to the pope’s April trip to the United States, we’d like to think that we have some of the best insights into who Pope Benedict is, what he’s going to find in his visit to America, and what he’ll likely do at some of his stops.
And now you can read some of those insights on our papal trip page. Our paying clients have had many of our advance stories, photos and graphics for almost two weeks (with more to come) as they plan their preview editions before the visit. But we’ve also posted some of the stories here to help convince you that Catholic News Service is your best source for reliable coverage of the church, especially from our award-winning Rome bureau.
Check back here often because we will be constantly updating this page with the latest developments and with more backgrounders on the trip’s implications.Â
On the page, we’re also providing additional insights into the trip by highlighting and linking to stories in Washington’s Catholic Standard and in Catholic New York, the on-the-scene archdiocesan newspapers that plan their own extensive coverage of the trip.
Also, don’t miss what some of our other clients are doing with their own special papal visit pages on their Web sites. For instance:
– Our Sunday Visitor also has a new papal visit page. Among its unique features are a place to compose your own prayers for Pope Benedict (also available on Facebook if you’re a member), another page where you can download a free papal prayer card, and a third page where you can order pamphlets for your parish on Pope Benedict and the history of the papacy.
– The National Catholic Register has a new blog on the pope, not just for the U.S. trip but for his visit to Australia this summer for World Youth Day. Called “The World Meets Benedict,” the blog is located at the easy-to-remember www.pope2008.com.