Pope Benedict XVI Often Criticizes Television For Showing Anti-Social, Violent and Sexual Programming Aimed At Children, But RAI, the Italian Public Broadcaster, Will Televise A British TV Documentary That Says The Pope As A Cardinal Maintained Church Secrecy In Child Sexual Abuse Cases, And, Again, The Church Is Not Pleased

Philip M. Stone May 23, 2007

Pope Benedict XVI on several occasions this year has criticized the media, particularly television, for programming particularly aimed at children that goes against their moral social good. But the Church had another TV issue to deal with this week as RAI, the Italian public broadcaster, planned to show a BBC documentary critical of the then Cardinal Ratzinger for enforcing church secrecy rules on its many child sexual abuse cases around the world.

RAI Director General Claudio Cappon, likened by some to Pontius Pilate for being  under tremendous pressure from Parliamentarians  crying everything from “censorship” to “media trial against the church”  has ruled the BBC Panorama program can be shown, but that  the program must invite prominent Church representatives to contest the documentary’s assertions. The program was to have been broadcast Thursday, but has been delayed to comply with the new rules.

The Pope this year has been very critical of various parts of the media for corrupting children. In his last such media critique May 20 he told crowds massed in St. Peter’s Square commemorating World Communications Day that the media’s portrayal of violence, antisocial behavior, and vulgar sexual content, especially when aimed at the young, is unacceptable. It was at least the third time this year that the Pope chose to criticize such media programming.

With this year’s theme, “Children and the Media: A Challenge for Education” the Pope said it was the responsibility of adults to educate the young in the ways of beauty, truth, and goodness” and that could only be supported by a media “to the extent that it promotes fundamental human dignity, the true value of marriage and family life and the positive achievements and goals of humanity on what they should be watching on television.” He said the young need help in being exposed to “what is aesthetically and morally excellent” such as “children’s classics in literature, to the fine arts and to uplifting music.”

And he laid it on the line on what he thinks a lot of children see today. “Any trend to produce programs and products – including animated films and video games – which in the name of entertainment  exalts violence and portrays anti-social behavior or the trivialization of human sexuality is a perversion, all the more repulsive when those programs are directed at children and adolescents.”

Thus with that background on how the Pope has taken upon himself to protect the world’s children from television programmers who promote the worst society has to offer, there is an added fascination to the battle that went on this week in Italy between the Vatican, politicians who support the Church, and the public broadcaster, RAI, over the network’s intention to show a BBC documentary critical of the Pope. The former Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger is portrayed as the enforcer of Vatican rules that required secrecy for church trials of priests and others charged in sexual child abuse cases that became headlines around the world in past years.

Not that the BBC program has not been seen in Italy. Complete with subtitles, it is the number one video accessed on Google Italy.

The BBC program, part of its Panorama series, with the provocative title, “Sex Crimes and The Vatican” was aired in the UK last October. British Roman Catholic bishops blasted it and said the BBC should be “ashamed of the standard of the journalism used to create this unwarranted attack on Pope Benedict.”

The program’s basic theme is that in1962 the Church in a secret document laid out the rules for how to deal with child abuse cases within the Church. There was to be an oath of secrecy on the child victim, the priest, and any witnesses. The document was revised in 2001 to deal more specifically with sex abuse cases, but it still remained secret. And before being elected Pope in 2005, it was then Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger who headed the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the Vatican department that enforced the rules.

The BBC premise is that Ratzinger continued the policy of secrecy in church trials in order to conceal evidence of abuse. But Avvenire, the newspaper of the Italian Bishops Conference, pointed out in a weekend editorial that the program was not accurate because only church trials were to be kept secret and not civil trials. The newspaper particularly noted that the Vatican document did not require abuse victims to remain quiet – indeed the document “obliged anyone knowledgeable of sexual abuse committed in the confessional to tell authorities or they would be excommunicated.”

Given that the video was being downloaded so often on Google, journalist Michele Santoro, a regular Church critic, wanted to show the documentary as part of a program called “Year Zero” on RAI, but Mario Landolfi, the conservative head of Parliament’s oversight committee for the public broadcaster, intervened saying the program should be blocked because it was nothing less than a “media execution squad ready to open fire on the Church and the Pope.”

When told that RAI would show the program, but with Church representatives present to give their side, Landolfi scoffed that RAI’s decision was “a Pontius Pilate solution.” As far as he was concerned the decision was still permitting “a media trial against the Catholic Church”.

There are great sensitivities in all this within Italy where there is always a heated debate on whether the Church has too much sway in Italian affairs.

And before the decision the verbiage kept rising. Two left-wing Parliamentarians said in a joint statement the program should air because “pedophilia in the Catholic Church is well known; there is no mystery about it.” Another Parliamentarian, Giuseppe Giuletti, who was once the leader of the RAI journalists’ union said the oversight committee had no right to “ask for a preventive censorship of any journalists or topics.”

But the Church fired back. Avvenire said those bloggers who had put the video with subtitles on Google were guilty of “infamous slander”. The newspaper claims the program tries to portray “Joseph Ratzinger as being the individual responsible for covering up the crime of pedophilia by priests,” and this was not the case.

Another politician, Antonia Satta called the program “trash journalism”.  Yet another, Giuseppe Caldarola, said, “The Vatican should realize that preventive censorship is a sign of weakness.”

And now the Italian public will get to make up their own minds.

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