Snake-tactics or sensationalism in reporting is not responsible journalism. 

In recent weeks, coverage of the sex-abuse scandal, and its cover up by bishops, has caused horror and outrage. Factual reporting of this reprehensible behavior is bad enough, but several media outlets (including in the Catholic press) have crossed over the line from information to sensationalism. What’s the difference? News stories provide readers with the information they need to understand complex situations and to make mature, responsible decisions or judgments. Sensationalism, on the other hand, seeks to provoke readers and to elicit from them emotional reactions including anger, disgust or rage.

In his 2018 World Day of Communications message earlier this year, Pope Francis urged journalists, and all who communicate online or in the traditional media, to speak the truth rather than spread gossip or enflame emotions. He challenged those who communicate “news” to adopt methodologies that employ a profound and careful process of discernment in order to unmask what could be called the “snake-tactics” (a reference to the serpent’s temptation of Eve in the Garden of Eden) used by those who disguise themselves in order to strike at any time and place.

To discern the truth, journalists need to identify everything that encourages communion and promotes goodness from whatever instead tends to isolate, divide, and oppose. Truth, therefore, is not really grasped when it is imposed from without as something impersonal, but only when it flows from free relationships between persons, from listening to one another. Nor can we ever stop seeking the truth, because falsehood can always creep in, even when we state things that are factually or historically true.

An impeccable argument can indeed rest on undeniable facts, but if it is used to hurt another and to discredit that person in the eyes of others, however correct it may appear, it is not truthful. We can recognize the truth of statements from their fruits: whether they provoke quarrels, foment division, encourage resignation; or, on the other hand, they promote informed and mature reflection leading to constructive dialogue and fruitful results.

What Pope Francis told journalists (and all of us) in his 2018 World Day of Communications message is that both the intentions and the effects of our messaging can help us discern whether or not we are transmitting or receiving the truth. “Falsehood can always creep in,” the Holy Father says, “even when we state things that are true.” So, if our communication is factually accurate but intended to discredit another or cause harm to individuals or communities, we may well be guilty of spreading fake news. This is doubly true when the information being shared is not accurate or a distortion of the truth.

Pope Francis is not promoting “a saccharine kind of journalism” that avoids dealing with serious problems. Instead, he advocates for a style of journalism that is “opposed to falsehoods, rhetorical slogans and sensational headlines.” He seeks forms of communication that are “less concentrated on breaking headlines” and more concerned with exploring the underlying causes of problems so that effective solutions can be found. This is not the journalism of escalating shouting matches or verbal abuse, the Pope says. It is not a form of social communication that is designed to provoke strong emotions. It is “a journalism of peace.”

As Chicago Cardinal Blasé Cupich wrote last week:

Sorrow, disgust, outrage — these are righteous feelings, the stirrings of the conscience of a people scandalized by the terrible reality that too many of the men who promised to protect their children, and strengthen their faith, have been responsible for wounding both.

We know this not only because of the admirable work of the many members of the news media who played an essential role in bringing this crisis into the light. Now, we have been made to face these scandals first and foremost by the courage of victim-survivors — the men and women who found the strength, even when doing so meant suffering again unimaginable pain, to come forward and seek justice from an institution that grievously failed them.

The truth can always be told in a manner that promotes healing and hope. Even the most grisly stories about clergy sex abuse (or blind, misguided church leaders) can be told in ways that are truthful and accurate without the “snake-tactics” used to open old wounds, inflict damage on bishops and priests, or discredit the one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church.

The truth about clergy sex abuse is bad enough. Let’s not make it worse by sensationalism or distortion.

Daniel Conway


Revised: 08/20/18