Dare to Ask: Are the media too harsh on Catholicism?

By Phillip J. Milano

Question

So much is made of anti-Semitism and how ugly it is, yet anti-Catholicism is alive and well on TV and in the movies. Live talk shows seem obsessed to bash the church.

Rene, Port Orange

Replies

Catholicism is the largest denomination in the U.S. and world (more than a sixth of the planet’s population), so what you may perceive as “a lot” is just proportionally appropriate.

Pete, 39, Pennsylvania

Experts say

You think we’re going to be biased and bitter writing this, just because Fr. Walsh told us in eighth grade we needed “psychological help” from St. Petronille’s nuns for asking too many questions in religion class? Or because Fr. Gabel told us before graduation from St. Francis that we weren’t “the sort of person a freshman would look up to?” C’mon. Have faith.

First, some housekeeping: At 1.2 billion, Catholics do make up more than a sixth of the world’s population. However, there are more than 1.5 billion Muslims, and if being skeptical or hostile toward religion counts as a religion (they call it irreligion), those folks number anywhere from 800 million to 1.1 billion, according to Britannica.com, Adherents.com and other global surveyors of religious persuasion. (Keep in mind, pollsters count anyone who doesn’t totally believe in somebody up there — even “Christian Atheists,” who apparently don’t buy into God but really like the moral teachings of Jesus.)

Let’s start with Philip Jenkins, professor of humanities at Penn State, who’s written lots of books on religion, including “The New Anti-Catholicism.”

He argues that in the case of abusive priests, the media tend to broad-brush the scandal as systemic.

“Even moderate commentators are writing as if priests around the world have taken secret vows of conspiracy, perversion, and omerta,” he wrote in The American Conservative in 2010. “Worse, this deviance is allegedly built into the church’s structures of command and control.”

But studies by the John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York found that at most, about 4 percent of U.S. priests were accused of sexual misconduct with a minor between 1950 and 2002, and of those, 149 could be classified as “super-predators.” Jenkins writes that he’s not downplaying the situation, just adding perspective.

He adds in “The New Anti-Catholicism” that “In the media, Catholicism is regarded as a perfectly legitimate target, the butt of harsh satire in numerous films and television programs,” while other faiths seem to get a pass.

He also writes that as liberal dissidents within the faith have blossomed, “For most of the media, a knee-jerk response holds that the Catholic Church and its hierarchy are always wrong, especially on matters of gender, sexuality, and morality.”

Well, it sort of is wrong, at least when it tries to push its power and morality on millions of laity, said Ann Neumann, editor of The Revealer, a publication of New York University’s Center for Religion and Media.

“Nobody made up these sex abuse scandals. No one forced the U.S. bishops to say we will provide health care only in the way we want to — not providing contraceptives, not removing feeding tubes from vegetative patients, not offering tubal ligations or [embryonic] stem cell research … About half their hospitals’ money comes from federal and state funding … but they refuse to operate according to individual rights.”

And let’s remember, the media thrives on controversy, she said.

“I’m afraid the media’s job is to give readers something to read. I’m not sure it’s their role to play something down,” she said.