You can say that it's mostly to stir up controversy, because that makes money in the long run. The media know that there are a lot of Christians in this country, so when you take the anti-religion perspective it's going to stir up controversy. I might venture to say that there are people in the mainstream media culture who don't like Christianity, so they really are using the tools they hav e to undermine it.
August 3, 2013
What interest does the media have in trying to debunk classical Christianity?
You can say that it's mostly to stir up controversy, because that makes money in the long run. The media know that there are a lot of Christians in this country, so when you take the anti-religion perspective it's going to stir up controversy. I might venture to say that there are people in the mainstream media culture who don't like Christianity, so they really are using the tools they hav e to undermine it.
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One is naive to think that it is just a way to make money. The media serves the purposes of those who would destroy the status quo just as Hitler and Stalin tried to do....level the field, make us all the same and destroy the faith of those who believe in freedom and individual responsibility........Put u
ReplyDeletes in "ghettos" of man made projects and feed us as serfs and villagers. Wake up! Undermining is a soft word,,,,,,,they intend to outlaw, destroy and supplant it with Big Brother.
Maybe thirty years ago when I was on an anti-TV kick I began to read the trade magazines for the industry. One quote ( and sorry, no, I can't source it at this point) gave the game away. An industry executive said, "What we're trying to do is to move the country left about 4% a year." He meant morally left.
ReplyDeleteTom Lucente, the commenter before me referred to your observations as naive, Fr. Barron, and that is the first word that came to my mind as well.
First of all, media is driven by advertising. What interest do people who are trying to sell things have in preserving us as an otherworldly, spiritual people? Their financial interest lies in precisely the opposite direction. Sex sells, but we want our people to be chaste. Gluttony sells, but we want our people to be abstemious, covetousness sells . . . etc.
Beyond that however, it has been overwhelmingly obvious for decades that the media are in an entirely different, hostile, spiritual camp. They are inimical to us for all kinds of reasons, not the least of which are their own personal moral biases and lifestyles.
At this juncture for us to wonder outloud why they are trying to debunk Christianity is of a piece with the many expressions of dismay that inevitably appear after the March for Life every January concerning the lack of media coverage. it gets a little ridiculous after a while.
It's as if the Allied powers were to wonder why the Axis powers aren't giving them a hand. it makes me cringe. We are at war! Of course they aren't going to cover the March on Washington. Of course they are trying to debunk us. There is absolutely no mystery about it.
Practically every Catholic family in this country is now paying a very heavy price in terms of family members lost to the faith precisely because our spiritual leaders did not wake up to this war half a century ago and urge us to get the mass media out of our homes and our lives. You (pl) have fifteen minutes of a Sunday morning to preach the Gospel to us, but have said NOTHING about our listening to the anti-gospel pouring into our homes and hearts by the hour every day. We have played by their rules. We have been moderate. No one could accuse us of being fanatics. We fit in. We lodge mild protests, but do not push our TVs down the backstairs.
As a result we are getting killed. Wachen sie auf, bitte!
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ReplyDeleteOur society today is locked in the age old human fallacy of trying to create God in Man's image. I believe that this is what Fr Barron was alluding to. And it is logically a money making maneuver...the more support you can generate, the more sponsorship money rolls in, etc. At some point in my career as a Science educator, I was contracted to review documentary films for one of the documentary networks (to remain unnamed). Often, in the films I found discrepant information given by "rogue" theological sources. It seemed that they were chosen, not for their expertise, but because they agreed with the abnormal ideal being presented. Sorry, but that's not good science in anyone's book to develop the self-sustained or self-determined hypothesis. It's one of the big problems today in medical and product testing, and has led to an overwhelming number of items prematurely put into the market place only to be recalled after "unforeseen" problems emerge. It's not so much that the issue is in the media; it's been there for a while. The issue is that American society is becoming so accustomed to that pattern that they expect nothing different or better. The present generation needs to remember that life, both physical and spiritual, is a continuum and did not suddenly materialize or originate spontaneously 40 years ago. There are very few new concepts today that have no base in the past; the faulty ideas of the past remain faulty today, even when renamed and repackaged. A real key to change is that as clergy, we cannot be afraid to address the issues from the pulpit. Personal embarrassment cannot enter into the picture. If we don't know anything about what's being said on the street, get out on the street and walk it a bit, and the oil will float to the top at some point; ignorance is not a good enough excuse either. You know you really touched a critical nerve when a parishioner walks out in the middle of a homily or accosts you for preaching the teachings of the Church rather than a popular misconception.
ReplyDeleteIf the faithful do not hear it from us, they are destined to hear something, most probably skewed and incorrect, from the next available source unafraid to say something, which is often public media.