Monday, March 24, 2008

Is Pope Benedict a Man of Mystery?

I guess I shall be doing more posts on the Pope and some basic Catholic Apologetics relating to the Papacy and other related Catholic items in preparation of the big event occurring in the next few weeks. That is Pope Benedict Tour USA 2008.I have blogged before that sometimes Priests sadly do not seem to get that they need to give refresher courses on some Catholic basics when some big public event occurs that will result in their flock getting a ton of questions. I suspect this will no different.

I am hoping that Catholic Blog land and others realize that such a visit is a huge opportunity to spread the faith. Many questions will come up to Catholics over the water cooler for instance about all this Pope stuff. Most will be well meaning. Of course we know the negative press will be part of it too. However I am willing to bet that Parishes on a whole get a lot more calls about RCIA classes during this period. We have had not had this opportunity since the John Paul the II death/Ratzinger election. Needless to say we were a tad unprepared for that this we should not be.

Amy Welborn has a good post today at Man of mystery!. It is a small plea WITH RESOURCES to the press not to have a preconceived story line about Pope Benedict and find stories to full fill that storyline. She ends her piece by saying:
To begin a news article with the assertion that “Benedict is still a mystery” is not, in fact, news reporting. It’s the creation of a thesis and then finding voices to support the thesis. It would be fantastic if, over the next month, journalists could get back to basics, stop trying to create stories and simply report: This is who Benedict is. This is what he writes about. This is what he talks about. These are the ideas that have formed his intellectual life and spirituality.
Mystery solved
.

I so agree. The only mystery to me is why the major media outlets refuse to hire reporters that know a thing about religion, Catholicism, and Christianity as a whole so to give insightful reporting to a huge segment of their audience.

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