Sentinel & Enterprise: Will Pope Francis be another John Paul XXIII?

You have to hand it to Charles St. Amand, the editor of the Sentinel & Enterprise, a local newspaper serving the Leominster-Fitchburg area as well as seven other cities and towns.  The man is most consistent.  When it comes to articles and editorials which touch upon the Catholic Church in particular and Catholicism in general,  Mr. St. Amand never troubles himself with getting the facts straight.  See here for example.

Take yesterday's editorial entitled, "Francis: Whose shoes will he fill?"  We read: "With the election of a new pope, Catholics around the world must be wondering what the latest successor to St. Peter has in mind for the Mother Church...He has shown himself to be socially conservative in Argentina by his stance against gay marriage and his backing of the traditional role of women in the Church, but he has also scolded some of his priests there for their refusal to baptize children born out of wedlock."

Actually, the terms "liberal" and "conservative" should never be applied to the Church.  As Dr. Dietrich von Hildebrand explains, "These terms, facilely applied to many natural realms, can be extremely misleading when applied to the Church.  It is of the very nature of Catholic Christian faith to adhere to an unchanging divine revelation, to acknowledge that there is something in the Church that is above the ups and downs of cultures and the rhythm of history.  Divine revelation and the Mystical Body of Christ differ completely from all natural entities.  To be conservative, to be a traditionalist, is in this case an essential element of the response due to the unique phenomenon of the Church.  Even a man in no way conservative in temperament and in many other respects progressive must be conservative in his relation to the infallible magisterium of the Church, if he is to remain an orthodox Catholic.  One can be progressive and simultaneously a Catholic, but one cannot be a progressive in one's Catholic faith.  The idea of a 'progressive Catholic' in this sense is an oxymoron, a contradictio in adjecto...With the labels conservative and progressive they [the intellectually dishonest with an anti-Catholic agenda] are in fact requiring the faithful to choose between opposition to any renewal, opposition even to the elimination of things that have crept into the Church because of human frailty (e.g., legalism, abstractionism, external pressure in questions of conscience, grave abuses of authority in monasteries) and a change, a 'progress' in the Catholic faith which can only mean its abandonment.  These are false alternatives.  For there is a third choice, which welcomes the official decisions of the Vatican Council (Vatican II) but at the same time emphatically rejects the secularizing interpretations given them by many so-called progressive theologians and laymen.  This thirs choice is based on unshakable faith in Christ and in the infallible magisterium of His Holy Church.  It takes it for granted that there is no room for change in the divinely revealed doctrine of the Church." (Trojan Horse in the City of God, pp. 10-11).

So it's not a question of Pope Francis being "conservative" or "progressive."  The Holy Father opposes so-called same-sex "marriage" and the ordination of women to the priesthood because divinely revealed doctrine cannot change. 

The Sentinel & Enterprise editorial refers to Pope Francis' predecessor on the Chair of Peter, the same Pontiff who called for Vatican II, as "Pope John Paul XXIII": "Will he [Pope Francis] maintain his life of simplicity and pursuit of social justice, or will he be the next John Paul XXIII?"  Obviously, the writer of this confused editorial was thinking of Pope John XXIII who was elected Pontiff on October 28, 1958 and installed on November 4th of that same year.  Pope John reigned as Vicar of Christ until June 3, 1963.

This is the sort of coverage of Catholicism that Catholics have come to expect from the Sentinel & Enterprise.  But they deserve better.

Related reading here.

Sentinel & Enterprise Editor: "We run a wide variety of columnists who are all over the political spectrum.."

Bernard Goldberg, in his book "Arrogance: Rescuing America from the Media Elite," notes how, "Quite simply, when it comes to gay issues, once again ideological journalism routinely fails the public - tilting the news of highly complex issues mainly to one side almost as a matter of course.  Once again, as with stories involving race or gender, narrow-interest pressure groups both inside and outside the newsroom are accorded special deference and respect.  And yes, once again it is liberal sympathizers, in this case straight ones, who help enforce the code, branding those who dissent from the approved liberal position as morally flawed..."  And, referring to those who oppose homosexuality because of their religious convictions, Goldberg writes, "I don't think someone is a homophobe just because he or she thinks that way - or, for that matter, honestly disagrees with some of the other items on the gay agenda.  More to the point, as it pertains to journalism, I think those people deserve a full, fair, and equal hearing.  The fact is, the gay agenda demands a fundamental shift in the way we've thought about sex and morals for a very, very long time.  It literally seeks to wipe away several thousand years of social and religious tradition.  So it would be crazy for us not to have a free and open debate about its consequences.  Yet what we most often see instead in the media is the sort of name-calling that wouldn't be tolerated on a playground.  Even traditionalist religious leaders and respected conservative social commentators regularly get called bigots for doing nothing more than upholding the tenets of their faith." (Arrogance, pp. 167, 168-169).

In this past Sunday's Sentinel & Enterprise, Bonnie Toomey categorized religious believers as being "stuck in the 20th century."  The implication being that those who adhere to the tenets of their faith tradition are somehow backward and "behind the times."  In addition, Ms. Toomey implied that it is this "backward thinking" which is responsible for "the many ugly stories involving harassment, mistreatment and even homicide."

I answered Ms. Toomey's asinine article in my last post.  What is most interesting is that a reader of this Blog contacted the editor of the Sentinel & Enterprise - Mr. Charles St. Amand -  to address her concerns regarding Ms. Toomey's article and he responded by asserting that the newspaper runs "a wide variety of columnists who are all over the political spectrum - left, right and center" and that he welcomes "letters and guest columns from..readers and community leaders on all topics."  This comes as a complete surprise to me.  For I have submitted guest columns and op-ed pieces in the past dealing with the issue of homosexuality and same-sex "marriage" and these have never seen the light of day.  Years ago, another Sentinel editor - Ann Connery Frantz - would routinely mock my views as she informed me that the paper would not be publishing them.

Does such an attitude represent a "full, fair and equal hearing"?  A fellow Catholic Blogger has written about the Worcester Telegram & Gazette's bias with regard to the issue of homosexuality.  See here.

Journalistic integrity or radical homosexual agenda?  You decide.

Related reading here