MESSAGE FOR THE 42nd WORLD COMMUNICATIONS DAY
Sunday, 4 May 2008
My Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
The theme of this year's World Communications Day - "The Media: At the
Crossroads between Self-Promotion and Service. Searching for the Truth in order
to Share it with Others" - highlights the important role of the media in the
life of individuals and society. As the Pope says in his message this year;
“there is no area of human experience, especially given the vast phenomenon of
globalization, in which the media have not become an integral part of
interpersonal relations and of social, economic, political and religious
development.”
The mass media today is pervasive, persuasive and all too often invasive.
Pope Benedict rightly acknowledges the contribution the media can make to the
diffusion of news, to knowledge of facts and to the dissemination of
information. At the same time the Pope warns that the mass media can be used for
ideological purposes, and “can tend to legitimise or impose distorted models of
personal, family or social life”. As Scottish Catholics, we know only too well
how true this is, and we are keenly aware of how rarely our own media represents
us as people of faith in a fair or balanced manner.
Today, mass communications can fairly be charged with losing the ethical
underpinning that once existed. It is a sad reality that those involved in the
production and dissemination of much of our media content do not themselves
share the religious or moral perspectives of their audience. There has occurred
a fundamental disconnection between the provider and the consumer. While the
last national census showed that over two thirds of Scots described themselves
as Christians, few of those who work in radio, television and the press share
this identity.
How then can they understand what motivates and engages us? How can they provide
us, their viewers, listeners and readers with appropriate content? The Pope
suggests we need to introduce "info-ethics", just as we have bioethics in the
field of medicine and scientific research.
Analysing the ethical implications of how information is transmitted would help
the media avoid becoming spokespersons for a secular and humanistic agenda. It
is crucial that those who work in this field seek to understand the moral and
ethical view of humanity shared by those of us who believe in God.
We each have a responsibility to help them in this task. We are all consumers of
the mass media and when we are misrepresented or maligned we must speak out.
Likewise, when our values and ideals are respected and represented fairly, we
must praise and commend.
Nationally this is exactly what our Catholic Media Office through imaginative
and ongoing engagement with the media seeks to do. To this end, to coincide with
World Communications day, the Scottish Catholic Media Office has created a new
website. The new website can be viewed at
www.scmo.org
I would urge you to visit this site. It will allow you to see first hand what
the Church has said on a wide range of issues, in turn preventing you from being
misled by partial or inaccurate media coverage. The new website includes audio
clips and video content, and includes a facility which allows anyone to
subscribe to all media releases simply by entering their email address. Again I
would urge you to subscribe in this way to the output of our Media Office
While the information service provided by the Media Office is free at the point
of use, it clearly has to be paid for. With this in mind I appeal to your great
generosity in asking you to contribute to today’s special communications
collection.
Finally, in the words of Pope John Paul II of happy memory: “Let us ask the Holy
Spirit to raise up courageous communicators and authentic witnesses to the
truth, faithful to Christ's mandate and enthusiastic for the message of the
faith.”
Yours devotedly in Christ
Bishop Philip Tartaglia
President, National Communications Commission