Welcome, USA TODAY readers!

Welcome, USA Today readers! ("Catholic bloggers getting busy", by Cathy Lynn Grossman. April 15, 2008) -- I see you've caught me in one of my grumpy moods:

Christopher Blosser, a New York web designer who turned his online Cardinal Ratzinger Fan Club into a Benedict fan club years ago, offers media commentary (benedictinamerica.blogspot.com). A recent post despaired of "cliché-ridden mainstream-media papal coverage — oftentimes with such barely-concealed hostility towards the Pope one doesn't know whether to laugh or cry."

For examples of shoddy papal reporting and/or commentary, Carl Olson points out How to make a complete fool of yourself in print (Insight Scoop April 14, 2008) and -- sorry -- takes USA Today to the woodshed (so to speak). But don't worry, it's not all bad -- browse this blog for some highlights in papal journalism as we cover the good AND the bad.

I'm pleased to see USA give due recognition to veteran Vatican commentator John Allen Jr.) and Amy Welborn (also contributing to the New York Times) and the National Catholic Register's Pope2008.com.

For background education on the thought of Benedict XVI, I would also recommend also the columns and commentary from Sandro Magister and Fr. James V. Schall (who'll I presume will be offering his analysis of Benedict's addresses) and the wealth of essays provided by the Pope's publisher in English, Ignatius Insight.

Finally, hard to believe one can do a piece on papal blogging and neglect to mention Thomas Peters (American Papist). C'mon, now! ;-)

"Shepherd One" and the absence of the in-flight press conference

John Allen, Jr. enlightens us regarding the Pope's flight to the U.S. (360 Degrees Blog, April 14, 2008):

In truth, there is no “papal plane” in the sense of a jet owned by the Vatican and used exclusively for papal travel. Instead, the pope flies on a regular commercial jet belonging to Alitalia, the Italian national airline, chartered by the Vatican for the period of a given trip. The pilots and crew are all Alitalia personnel.

Most of the passengers aboard the papal plane are actually journalists, representing a cross-section on the world’s major secular and Catholic media outlets. This time, 70 journalists are accompanying Pope Benedict to the United States, a figure which includes print reporters, TV and radio correspondents, producers, cameramen and photographers.

Journalists pay top dollar to fly with the pope – the roundtrip airfare this time is roughly $4800, comparable to a full-fare business class ticket for what usually amounts to economy class accommodations. ...

Allen also explains why, unlike the 2007 flight to Brazil, the curia have declined to hold an in-flight press conferences with the Pope:

From the outside, that might seem a curious choice, given that there’s plenty of time for a real press conference, and given that Benedict XVI is a veteran university professor who relishes intellectual give-and-take. Yet Vatican officials have long memories, and they recall well what happened on the Brazil flight. Pope Benedict answered a question about possible excommunication of pro-choice Catholic politicians in Mexico, seeming to endorse a hard-line position. That became the dominant day-one story of the Brazil trip, effectively blotting the pope’s formal message out of the sky.

This time around, it would seem that trip organizers are determined to keep the pope “on message” as he enters the world’s premier sound-bite culture.

Washington Times screams "Forced Conversion!"

• When the reporter is not a Catholic, by Julia Duin, assistant national editor/religion, The Washington Times. July 2, 2008.
• Jeff Miller (Curt Jester) responds to the bellyaching.

Mark Shea vs. the MSM

Shea's Iron Law of Media-Reported Benedictine Growth Catholic Exchange. April 1, 2008

Three years ago, the Mainstream Media (MSM) gathered in a special conclave in Rome to discuss the disastrous election to the Papacy of Ratzinger the Enforcer, God’s Rottweiler, the hardliner, inflexible, rigid, etc. blah, blah. Some of us suggested to our television screens that the Talking Heads might want to wait more than a few seconds before doing the autopsy on the pontificate of Pope Benedict XVI. But the herd of independent minds that are the MSM had their story and they were sticking to it.

They’ve stuck to it for three years now. The poor dears really don’t have the foggiest clue how to understand Benedict. They huddle together in packs, quoting each other and loading up their computers with macros that spit out the required text without their having to fire a single neuron to write it. That’s why, when you Google the following clichés, you get these kinds of numbers:

“Benedict XVI” rigid – 52,800
“Benedict XVI” hardliner – 27,100
“Benedict XVI” inflexible – 10,300
“Benedict XVI” dominating – 290,000
“Benedict XVI” ruthless – 126,000
“Benedict XVI” enforcer – 28,800
“Benedict XVI” archaic – 22,400
“Benedict XVI” medieval – 169,000
“Benedict XVI” intolerant – 148,000
“Benedict XVI” backward – 122,000
“Benedict XVI” “Hitler Youth” – 30,700
“pope cracks down” – 1,080,000

You get the picture. The MSM has had a template since the day Benedict donned the papal mitre and it has never occurred to most of the people who type or talk about him in the MSM to vary from it. They simply school together like guppies and tell each other (and us) that the rigid, hardline, inflexible, dominating and ruthless enforcer’s archaic, medieval, intolerant and backward thought, words and deeds are what you’d expect from a former Hitler Youth. Apparently, the man has spent every minute of every day cracking down on everything with a pulse over a million times. To hear the MSM tell it, the guy just hates rational thought and freedom.

I think Shea's general assessment of papal coverage by the mainstream press is accurate -- however, his particular demonstration by way of "Google searches" is a bit sketchy, given actual search engine methodology (Steven Skellmeyer at The Fifth Column elaborates).

Nevertheless, having tracked Benedict's coverage in the press for the past, oh, 8 years now I'd agree that Shea's criticism is on the mark.

Related

• Tackling the Mainstream Media Cliches Pope2008.com. April 5, 2008.

LA Times Lectures the Pope

LA Times to Pope Benedict: Don't Listen to Conservative Catholics, by Dave Pierre. NewsBusters.org November 14, 2007:

A trip to the United States from Pope Benedict is still nearly six months away (April 2008), but the Los Angeles Times is already in a tizzy. An editorial in Wednesday's Times ("Teaching the Pope" 11/14/07) advises the Pope to shun "hard-liners" and "conservative Catholics" and listen to "other Catholics." The Times is concerned with the issue of whether or not abortion-friendly politicians who claim they are Catholic should receive Holy Communion. . . .

• Response from Carl Olson Insight Scoop:

  Because, of course, we should assume that the 80-year-old pope from Germany is completely clueless about democracy and the super-special, ultra-unique status of America, whose Constitution is nothing but a glowing homage to "Separation of Church and State!" Perhaps the author of this piece is unaware that Benedict has been studying the relationship between Church and state for, oh, over fifty years now . . .

• Response: Andrew Sumereau of American Thinker November 17, 2007:

  When the decline of newspaper readership and influence is chronicled, an enterprising author could do little better than to use this editorial as a lodestone revealing the direction of oblivion. It evinces the fulsome idiocy that drove newspapers out of business. "Teaching the pope" brings a new low to the meaning of the word nonsense. . . .

  The two thousand year history of a church, which began amidst Roman Emperors and has seen every political system, economic system, culture, geography, and condition under the sun, continues to unfold. Meanwhile the Los Angeles Times marks a century and a quarter this year, and anxiously wonders about its future prospects.

• Response: Catholics in the Public Square November 14, 2007:

  Perhaps the Los Angeles Times should consider whether the Church should remain "a public and publicly relevant authority" to those who profess the Catholic faith and yet obstinately and publicly repudiate her very teaching by their legislative actions?

Pope Coming to U.S.; Washington Post Responds by Interviewing Naysayers, by Jay Anderson. Pro Ecclesia November 14, 2007.