What Media Bias? Part 114

April 6th, 2008 at 08:42am Mark Noonan

Actually, we’re just anticipating the media bias vis a vis Benedict XVI’s upcoming visit:

With a papal visit less than two weeks away, American readers can anticipate a spate of “analysis” stories, assessing the health of US Catholicism and predicting the content of the Pope’s message to America. Be forewarned: most of this coverage will be grossly inaccurate.

Writing for National Review Online, George Weigel cites a tendentious Washington Post piece as the early favorite for what he calls the Father Richard McBrien Prize in Really Inept Vaticanology. Weigel makes a strong case; the Post piece is definitely a contender. But there will be others, equally wrongheaded, before Pope Benedict’s visit is finished. The Boston Globe has not yet weighed in with its editorial opinion, and Father McBrien himself can never be counted out. This competition will be fierce.

The most popular theme for simplistic journalists is the contrast between the blithe spirit of American cafeteria Catholics and the inflexible dogma of the Roman Pontiff. (If you see the term “Panzerkardinal” in what purports to be a news story, you’re probably reading another entry in Weigel’s competition.) It’s easy to see the papal visit as a confrontation: the Vatican enforcer coming to town to bring order to American chaos.

We can expect the MSM to trot out the usual suspects - the Catholic theologian who stands athwart Catholic teaching; the pro-abortion Catholic; pro-female priest Catholic…heck, one of these days I’m sure we’ll come across the differently-abled, transgendered person of color Catholic (who wants to be a priest and nun, at the same time), just to make certain all bases are covered. The general line of these stories is to demonstrate that the Church is out of step with its membership and this is the reason why the Church in America shed so many members over the past few decades…such a line makes for, perhaps, a nifty narrative for an ignorant editor, but it doesn’t even touch upon the truth.

The Catholic Church is not, however, a democracy - truth cannot be decided by popular vote. It doesn’t matter if the MSM could demonstrate that every single Catholic in America is opposed to a particular item of Catholic doctrine - it wouldn’t change. Doctrine is something that comes from God and to determine just what shall be obligatory on believers is something only discovered after very careful - and, usually, very long - deliberation all up and down the line in the Catholic Church. You’ll never hear such phrases as “lightening fast” and “lickety split” applied to the way the Church considers matters of faith and morals. So, the crtitics will hammer away - female priests! Married priests! Birth control! Abortion! Such matters have been settled, and won’t be unsettled unless something extraordinary happens…and that thing won’t be the carping and complaining of certain people who really wish Truth could bend to their desires.

As for me, Ive decided that I’m going to keep track of “Panzerkardinal” during the Pope’s visit - for my own amusement (and for a future “What Media Bias?”), I want to see how many times it is used over the next month.

Tags: Christianity, media bias

Entry Filed under: Media, Religion