The Chicago Tribune today discusses the impact that religious blogs have on both discussions of faith and on the ecclesiastical structures of their churches. The article ranges among the denominations, but when it comes to the Catholic Church, it leaves me scratching my head. The issue it chooses to highlight is the Boston archdiocese’s financial transparency disclosures. In this article on the impact of blogs on the Church, can you pick out what’s missing from this anecdote?
Roman Catholic Archbishop of Boston Sean P. O’Malley pledged last year to open the diocese’s financial books for public inspection after an effective Web-based campaign among disgruntled laity raised the specter that the Massachusetts Legislature would make such disclosure a legal requirement.
“I wouldn’t say the church has changed its ways, but we are raising attention for these issues,” said John Moynihan, spokesman for Voice of the Faithful, a lay reform group formed after the clergy abuse scandal of 2002. He said that reporters, who seldom used to quote dissenting laity, now read the group’s positions on developing events and call seeking comments to balance what the church hierarchy is saying.
So, um, where are the blogs that did this? What was this “effective Web-based campaign,” because I’m not seeing it. Is there some super-secret network of Voice of the Faithful blogs out there? What we have is the media sticking to the template despite the fact that it has no rational connection to the story. The template says that when you write a story about disgruntled Catholics, you contact Voice of the Faithful for a quote, regardless of whether Voice of the Faithful represents anyone but their very small membership or even has anything to do with the story.
Funny way of making it accessible
