Article 4 “What should be the media policy about identifying a person’s faith in their reporting?”

Rev. Geoffrey Kerslake.
Ottawa Citizen, January 2, 2011. Reprinted with author’s permission.

The media have a critically important role to play in defending religious freedom by fostering a climate of open dialogue and mutual respect between members of different faith communities as well as persons who choose not to belong to any faith. The larger question behind this one is to what extent do the media report the “facts of an event” and to what extent do they “create” the news through editorial policy about what is “worth reporting?”

As a Christian, I am often bemused that some events are deemed newsworthy whereas others which conflict with the prevailing political climate are ignored; for example, for a number of years the media chose not to report the annual prolife March for Life through downtown Ottawa, despite the presence of thousands of peaceful demonstrators from several different Christian and non-Christian traditions who gathered to first listen to a number of speeches by Members of Parliament from different parties on the Hill before uneventfully marching through downtown Ottawa.

In the prophetic document from the Second Vatican Council, the Decree On the Media of Social Communications (Inter Mirifica) in 1963, the Church wrote: “It is quite evident what gravely important responsibilities (the media) have in the present day when they are in a position to lead the human race to good or to evil by informing or arousing mankind” (n. 11).

The media have such a grave responsibility because of the power they have not only to report the facts of events but also because in choosing what to report and how to report it, the media play a role in shaping public opinion. For religious freedom to be maintained and to flourish, it is thus imperative that there is a climate of honest dialogue and mutual respect between all persons.