Cardinal Foley on the Church and the MSM

Tim Townsend of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch interviews Cardinal John Foley, who for 23 years (1984-2007) was President of the Pontifical Council for Social Communications:

Q: What are the differences between John Paul and Benedict in terms of how they worked with media?

Foley: John Paul was a more dramatic figure, and given to dramatic gestures, which the present Holy Father is not. But the present Holy Father is very open to the media. He's very kind, gentle, and he has given interviews before he has gone to specific countries. He did for the Polish media before he went to Poland. He did for the German media before he went to Cologne for World Youth Day. So, it would be nice if he'd do that for the American media, too, but I don't know. He doesn't feel as secure in English. He speaks English very well, but I guess he just lacks confidence. He's a professor, so he like to get things right. …

And, summarizing why the MSM so often does a poor to horrible job of reporting on religion:

Q: When you received an alumni award from Columbia in 1985, what made you suggest a course in religion journalism, which the school now offers?

Foley: Unfortunately, many assignment editors confuse ignorance with objectivity, and they assign someone to cover religion who knows absolutely nothing about it, thinking that in that way they're being unbiased. I said, "If you did that in sports, imagine the riots in the street."

That's probably because for many people, sports are religion, while religion is just a private matter worth making sport of, but little else.

Molly Hemingway of Get Religion comments.