CATHOLIC JOURNALISM. - It is journalism founded on Christian principles and inspired by them.
I. DEFINITION
Journalism is one of the typical aspects of modern society; although its origins can indeed be traced far back, for various causes, both intrinsic and external, it remained in the past an episodic and particular aspect until the end of the 18th century. Today, by contrast, it can rightly be considered a "social service" of information for the individual and of formation of public opinion, through the reproduction and interpretation, in the form of news and articles, of everyday life simultaneously with events. Its importance has by no means been diminished by the development of other, more modern means of information, such as radio broadcasts, nor will it probably be, at least for a long time, by television; nevertheless, this importance must not be exaggerated either, especially where the press is free by law and therefore subject to the control of public opinion and to open debate; its influence is deeper where the press, all oriented in the same direction, offers no comparisons and fears no public objections.
Characteristics of modern journalism are the speed and breadth of the information at its disposal, the rapidity of the means of printing, its very wide circulation, but even more the fact that journalists constitute a class apart, with their own way of thinking and their own opinions. "Journalistic style," like "journalistic circles," are turns of phrase that nevertheless express a reality existing as an element of modern society.
Catholic journalism does not differ in general characteristics from journalism to which this adjective is not applied; indeed, Catholic newspapers have the same purpose as the others, use the same technical means, have the same relations with their readers; just as Catholic journalists are professionals no more and no less than other journalists. The fact that Catholic journalism is predominantly at the service of an idea, and therefore is predominantly "ideological" journalism, distinguishes it, if anything, only from a purely "informative" journalism, where such a thing exists, but in this respect aligns it with other forms of equally "ideological" journalism. From all these other forms, however, it is distinguished by its accentuated observance of the norms of a more rigorous professional and social morality, which is not generic, but founded on Christian principles and informed by them.
From the social point of view, Catholic journalism is instead part of that complex of thought and works of militant Catholics which in modern times has taken the name of Catholic Action; and this even though, historically and geographically, it has sometimes preceded and sometimes followed the organized movement of Catholic Action, being always its principal auxiliary if not indeed one of its determining elements; so much so that it will be seen how there is no truly Catholic journalism in those countries in which, for various and differing reasons, there is no Catholic Action, and vice versa.
II. HISTORY
The modern newspaper was born together with that movement of social renewal that took shape at the beginning of the 19th century, and whose rather complex characteristics have not yet been fully clarified; and like that movement, the newspaper too was regarded and called a "child of the Revolution" and as such both exalted and dreaded. If today the journalistic relics of a century and a half ago bring a smile of commiseration, such was not the opinion of the readers of the time; on whom the mere fact already made a great impression that they learned relatively prompt news even from distant countries, and comments and interpretations that appeared of a supreme audacity. The articles impressed even more than the news, and particularly the articles called "leading" articles, which gave and give the opinion of the newspaper and of the milieu from which it emanates, on subjects of a political character. Similar articles began to be published in English newspapers as early as 1904, but on the continent much later; the French and German gazettes began publishing them during the French Revolution; the Italian ones in the period immediately preceding 1848, and this despite the fact that in Italy the date of birth of the newspaper in a form resembling today's can be fixed at the middle of the 17th century, while in other countries it is later. But these were newspapers of a predominantly literary character, both because of another kind they would not have been permitted by the governments, and because in reality, before the democratic conscience was awakened (or reawakened) in the people, no other subjects were sought after. Then the papers became political with a revolutionary character; reduced to silence under the Napoleonic Empire, at the fall of Napoleon there was indeed a flowering of periodicals of a Catholic character, but the restrictive laws of the governments of the Restoration obliged them to remain in the purely moral and religious, scientific and literary field. Gradually, however, as time passed, the pressure of the press on the governments also grew, aiming at freedom, and this movement, as far as the Catholic press is concerned, manifested itself especially in Italy and France.
In Italy the first multi-weekly periodical (it came out three times a week) of a political-moral character appeared in Modena, where the restrictive laws on freedom of the press were milder, and it was La voce della verità, gazzetta dell'Italia centrale, directed by Giovanni Galvani and published from 5 July 1831 to 28 June 1841. In the following years others of the same type were published; of them it suffices to say that the main contributors were the prince of Canosa, the ball Samminatelli, the count Monaldo Leopardi; periodicals which, although animated by good intentions and entirely averse to offending religion, were rather concerned above all with defending legitimist principles. In the other States of the peninsula the press was reduced entirely to some official sheet, compiled and printed under the care of the respective governments, with official communications, a little foreign news usually taken from the official sheets of the other States, and some article; to a few cultural, or artistic, or variety weeklies; and to a few scientific, religious or juridical periodicals; and this both in Lombardo-Veneto, where Austria carefully watched every manifestation of novelty, and in the other States of the peninsula that conformed to its way of acting, and in the Papal State and also in the Kingdom of Sardinia where Charles Albert, awaiting his hour, left the government to Solaro della Margherita.
Between 1846 and 1848, as a repercussion of the changed social and political conditions throughout Europe, freedom of the press was granted everywhere, which, owing to the unpreparedness of the writers of the time, the vagueness of the norms governing it, and the uncertainty of those who had to apply them, degenerated into the most unbridled license. Dozens and dozens of weekly periodicals were born, many of them of an unbridled anticlerical character, and the first daily newspapers were born, some of a patriotic character, others of a socialistic character; at the same time Catholic daily newspapers arose.
The first to be published in Italy was L'armonia della religione con la civiltà (1848-70), which came out in Turin on 14 July 1848 together with Cavour's Il risorgimento, with Brofferio's Il messaggero, with Botero's La gazzetta del popolo. The newspaper was promoted by a committee headed by the marquis Birago di Vische and mons. Moreno, bishop of Ivrea; its direction was entrusted to the theologian Guglielmo Audisio, who had as his collaborator the very young theologian Giacomo Margotti. In the same days another daily newspaper of a Catholic character was born in Modena, Il messaggero di Modena (1848-59), which maintained a conciliatory line toward the governments of the time; L'armonia instead immediately became an extremely combative newspaper; composed, like all the newspapers of the time, more of articles than of news, it immediately fought the first great battle in favor of the Jesuits against the minister Gioberti; it immediately afterward launched another against the D'Azeglio cabinet, whose minister of justice, Siccardi, had presented the laws dispossessing ecclesiastical property; then the Government, on 7 Sept. 1849, summarily dismissed Audisio from rector of the royal basilica of Superga. Audisio, without waiting to be expelled, left the Kingdom of Sardinia and took refuge in Tuscany; the newspaper passed to the direction of Margotti, who was then barely 26 years old and who moreover accentuated its combative character. In 1857 it was this newspaper that, as a reaction to the work carried out by Cavour to prevent the election of Catholic deputies, proposed that those elected should resign and began the campaign for the famous formula: "neither elected, nor electors," later reinforced by the "non expedit." Cavour then suppressed the newspaper, which however resumed publication the following year. In 1863 Margotti, having lost the marquis Birago and in disagreement with mons. Moreno, left L'armonia and founded L'unità cattolica (1863-1929).
Meanwhile, in the face of the anticlerical battle that Freemasonry, then reawakening, was rekindling throughout the peninsula, pope Pius IX had taken a position also in favor of the Catholic press and in the encyclical Inter multiplices (1853) had energetically defended it. Throughout the peninsula there then arose very numerous weeklies and numerous combative and audacious Catholic daily newspapers, but poor in means and therefore short-lived. Among the reviews La civiltà cattolica (Naples 1850) had immediately established itself. At that time some of the daily newspapers that later had the greatest resonance were also born, among them L'osservatore romano (1861), which later became, from a free newspaper, the organ of the Holy See.
The heroic period of the Catholic press in Italy may be considered precisely the forty years from 1861, the year of the proclamation of the Kingdom, to the end of the century. In this forty-year span fall the birth of the Gioventù cattolica and then of the Opera dei congressi e comitati cattolici, the Vatican Council, Rome as capital of Italy, the financial settlement laws of the new State, the fall of the Right and the government of Depretis and Crispi, the attempts at conciliation with the Holy See alternating with the most heated episodes of anticlericalism, the transformation of socialism from a revolutionary workers' movement into a political party, the African war, the Milan riots, the Pelloux reaction, and finally the assassination of King Umberto and the passage from the government of the Left to the liberal one — all events that had a different but always profound repercussion on the fortunes of the Catholic press. Indeed, the Catholics, in this period, abstaining entirely from elections, had no other way to influence public opinion than their press, to be set against a policy and a press that were vivaciously and often violently anticatholic and anticlerical. It should be added that not even the Catholics of action were united among themselves in this battle, inasmuch as some remained intransigent toward the "revolutionary" and liberal State, and most jealous defenders of the pontifical protests, especially regarding the temporal power; while others gradually became less averse to the Italian State and, while remaining faithful to the pontifical directives, sought to interpret them in an ever more conciliatory manner, thinking thereby to be able to influence more effectively the transformation of the State from adversary to State of all; naturally the Catholic press was itself part of these two currents, undergoing and in part determining their orientations, their clashes, their repercussions.
Typical representatives of the intransigent current were L'unità cattolica and L'osservatore cattolico of Milan (1864-1907), which had a highly turbulent existence, identified in large part with that of its most celebrated director, Fr. Davide Albertario. Born in the same year as the Syllabus, L'osservatore cattolico found itself in the midst of the battle against rationalist liberalism waged by the intransigent neo-Guelph group; Albertario assumed its direction in 1869, and maintained it for thirty years, suffering every sort of hostility, including from illustrious ecclesiastics such as Fr. Antonio Stoppani, up to arrest and detention. If one must recognize that the battle of L'osservatore cattolico was even too intransigent and that at times it paid no heed to the terms used in its polemics against anyone who opposed it, one must also say that it had beneficial effects even on the other dailies of the peninsula, to which it showed how one could stand before adversaries with an open face.
In 1874 the first congress of the Opera dei congressi e comitati cattolici recommended the diffusion of the press and the appeal did not fall on deaf ears; the Catholic dailies, which were 7 in 1860, 13 in 1865, 16 in 1870 and 18 in 1874, rose to 21 in 1884 and to 26 in 1893. These were for the most part small organs of a diocesan, or provincial, or at most regional character; nevertheless some deserve to be remembered for the importance they had at the time or because they still exist: Il cittadino di Brescia (1878) with Giorgio Montini; L'ordine di Como (1879), later became very well known with Fr. Antonio Gaffuri; L'eco di Bergamo (1880), founded by Stanislao Medolago Albani and Niccolò Rezzara, leaders of the social movement of Catholics before Toniolo; L'unità cattolica, transferred from Turin to Florence in 1892 under the direction of Enrico Mastracchi and Giuseppe Sacchetti; Il corriere nazionale (1883) of Stefano Scala in Turin, which later merged with L'Italia reale (1894) of G. B. Mondada; La lega lombarda (1886) in Milan, first directed by Giuseppe Sacchetti, then by Giuseppe Saccardo, then merged in 1907 with L'osservatore cattolico into L'unione, which in 1912 became L'Italia; La difesa of Venice (1882-1917), the newspaper that Pius X favored; L'avvenire in Bologna, founded in 1896 by the Emilian episcopate and directed by Filippo Crispolti, and which became in 1902 L'avvenire d'Italia under the direction of Rocca d'Adria; La vera Roma, which became a daily in 1904, widely circulated under Enrico Filiziani.
The convulsive and disproportionate reaction that the Di Rudini cabinet opposed to the uncoordinated popular riots of 1898 struck the Catholic press as well: in Milan Albertario was tried and convicted, in Florence L'unità cattolica was suppressed for some months, elsewhere other newspapers suffered the same fate.
The recovery, after the storm, also marked the opening of a new period in which the so-called "intransigent" newspapers declined, and the conciliatory ones asserted themselves; the change was determined by three factors: the affirmation of Toniolo's social directives, corroborated by pontifical sanction in Rerum novarum; the participation of Catholics in administrative elections and the gradual replacement of the Margottian formula "neither elected nor electors" by that of Filippo Meda, "preparation in abstention," of which Meda himself became the proponent precisely in L'osservatore cattolico when he became its director; the recognition of the necessity of a greater union among Catholics both in the face of external dangers and in the face of internal ones that were beginning to have a name: Fr. Romolo Murri.
To achieve unity in the journalistic field, at least among the major organs, Count Grosoli, who had been the last president of the Opera dei congressi (dissolved by Pius X in 1904), founded in 1908 the Unione editoriale romana (later italiana), which had the task of coordinating administratively and editorially the newspapers adherent. Members of this organization, which was commonly called the "Catholic trust," were various newspapers of northern and southern Italy: Il corriere d'Italia, founded in 1903 by Gaetano De Felice under the name Corriere di Roma; L'avvenire d'Italia, then directed by Rocca d'Adria; L'Italia, directed by Paolo Mattei Gentili; Il momento of Turin, directed by Angelo Mauri; Il messaggero toscano of Pisa, founded by Card. Maffi, Il corriere di Sicilia of Palermo; this last newspaper soon ceased publication following demonstrations of monarchical loyalism, which were deemed excessive at that moment.
The "trust" had its advantages and its disadvantages; it standardized the editorial line of the member newspapers and improved their services from within and especially from without, sending Domenico Russo to Paris, the first Catholic journalist sent abroad with this assignment; but it also notably hampered their editorial operation through the imposed review that the Rome headquarters had to carry out, both of the foreign correspondence and of the principal contributions, and also of the editorials of the various editors. Unity of direction was assured, but in practice there existed a single management, not always entrusted to competent and suitable persons, with six local sub-managements. These drawbacks kept some newspapers out of the "trust," whose editors wished to maintain their independence, just as the conciliatory line kept the intransigent newspapers out. These newspapers indeed engaged in a bitter battle against the "modern" newspapers (a dangerous little adjective in a time of anti-modernist battle), and the battle culminated when Pius X in a letter to the Lombard episcopate of 1 July 1911 censured "certain newspapers" for their line, among which it was not difficult to recognize those of the "trust"; the censure was then explicit on 1 Dec. of the following year, when the issue of the Acta Apostolicae Sedis published a "warning" that said: "To remove the misunderstanding that certain newspapers are creating among the clergy and the faithful, it is declared that the Holy See does not recognize as conforming to the pontifical directives and to the norms of His Holiness's letter to the Lombard episcopate, dated 1 July 1911, the following newspapers: L'avvenire d'Italia, Il corriere d'Italia, Il corriere di Sicilia, L'Italia, Il momento, and others of the same kind, whatever may be the intentions of some excellent persons who direct and assist them." The Congregation of Religious, interpreting the warning in the most restrictive manner, declared shortly afterward that not only subscribing but also reading such newspapers was forbidden to religious without authorization from their major superiors. It was a grave blow for the newspapers of the "trust," which nevertheless continued to be printed, endeavoring to conform as much as possible to the pontifical directives. The measure, however, was in force for only a short time because in the art. of 1914 Pope Benedict XV, to Msgr. Falcini, bishop of S. Miniato, who had questioned him on the matter, had Cardinal Gasparri, Secretary of State, reply: "the aforesaid warning did not have the character of a prohibition." The newspapers of the "trust" took on new vigor, while those that persisted in remaining faithful to forms of intransigence that no longer answered to the times had ended or were ending during the war of 1915-18. But even the defects of the editorial union during the period of that same war prevailed over the advantages and the "trust" was dissolved in 1916; each newspaper resumed its own autonomy.
During the war of 1915-18 the Catholic dailies effectively seconded the movement for the insertion of Catholics into political life, which led in 1919 to the constitution of the Italian Popular Party. Almost all the Catholic newspapers fully adhered to it, so much so as to feel the backlash of the struggle that Fascism waged against the democratic parties and then against the press that did not wholly submit to its directives. Some, such as L'avvenire d'Italia and Il corriere d'Italia, adhered to the National Center (a political organization of Catholics that flanked Fascism); others came to an end, such as Il messaggero toscano and almost all the minor ones; others continued in their line of action as Catholic press, such as L'Italia. The year 1929 brought a grave blow to the Catholic press: that is, Il momento and Il corriere d'Italia also disappeared, above all because the political current to which they adhered had but scant correspondence in the Italian Catholic class, and L'unità cattolica, which with the Conciliation between State and Church had in a certain sense concluded its historical cycle. There remained L'avvenire d'Italia, taken over by the Society of St. Paul, which renewed it, L'Italia, Il nuovo cittadino, which succeeded in 1930 Il cittadino of Ernesto Calligari, and a few of a purely diocesan character. In 1931, L'avvenire d'Italia established an editorial office in Rome to print there its own almost autonomous edition; from this edition was born, through the initiative of Augusto Cirici, general president of Catholic Action, L'avvenire of Rome.
In the remaining Fascist period these few dailies remained alone in Italy in representing a press not entirely bound to the Fascist directives and at times — as in the 1931 conflict between Catholic Action and Fascism — even in opposition. In the period of German occupation that followed the armistice of 1943 almost all temporarily ceased publication, either because they were unable to continue owing to the destruction caused by the war to their plants (such as L'avvenire d'Italia) or spontaneously in order not to submit to the impositions of the Social Republic and the German occupiers (such as L'Italia, which was provisionally transformed into a weekly). In the last Fascist period and up to the liberation L'osservatore romano — whose authority and circulation had been steadily growing under the direction of Count Giuseppe Dalla Torre, especially for its polemical campaigns against Nazism and against Fascist abuses — remained in fact the only one to represent the Catholic press in Italy.
In France, after various unsuccessful attempts, one of which dates back to 1680, L'ami de la religion was born in 1814; later, through the efforts of Msgr. Dupanloup, it changed in 1849 from a tri-weekly into a daily, free from political influences and of a distinctly Catholic inspiration. The anticlerical revolution of 1830 brought about the rise of one of the best-known French dailies: L'avenir (1830-31), which had as its motto "Dieu et la liberté" and as its editors Lamennais, Lacordaire and Montalembert; it was the first daily dedicated to religious thought, not without social overtones. Written with a wealth of resources equal to that of the other great dailies of the time, and by true journalists, it seemed destined for a brilliant future; instead it ran into doctrinal statements that were disapproved of by Rome; the three journalists suspended publication and left for Rome, "pilgrims of God and of liberty," to obtain the pontifical directives; these came, but they were the condemning encyclical Mirari vos (August 1832). The newspaper never resumed publication; certain provincial organs, born in its own milieu, continued its ideas while containing them more prudently within the orthodox line. From one of these minor organs, through the efforts of Abbé Migne (the future publisher of the Patrologie), arose L'univers religieux politique, philosophique et littéraire (1833-1907), which immediately gained renown and wide circulation, which grew further when Louis Veuillot became its director in 1842; some of the finest pages of 19th-century French literature and some of the most heated polemics of that same century remain linked to the names of Veuillot and of L'univers. With the revolution of 1848 all positions changed once again; Catholicism had become popular again and many newspapers drew inspiration from it, even in judging political events. Nevertheless, from this moment on, Catholics were for some decades divided by the institutional question, and the press felt that division; against L'univers, which had gone over to the republic, though in a conservative sense, stood L'ère nouvelle (1849), a monarchist paper founded by the priest Maret and by Ozanam and at first directed by Lacordaire. Under Napoleon III the press was severely monitored, and in 1860 L'univers was suppressed, after having first supported Napoleon and then opposed him; the newspaper resumed in 1867, and in the meantime its publisher had replaced it with Le monde (1860-96), directed by Eugène Coquille, one of the finest pens in French journalism. In the same year as the rebirth of L'univers, Msgr. Dupanloup, the Viscount de Melun and Auguste Cochin succeeded in merging several small organs into a new great daily, Le français, of a rather moderate and liberal character. The republican resurgence of 1870 once again divided Catholics, who under Napoleon had been in a certain sense united against him, into republicans and monarchists of various leanings: thus L'univers and Le monde were for the Count of Chambord, other Catholics with Édouard Hervé were for the Count of Paris, first in Le journal de Paris and then in Le soleil (1873-1914), the first French newspaper to be sold for five centimes; finally others were for the Bonapartes with Paul de Cassagnac, who founded L'autorité, which likewise ceased in 1911. Moreover, at that time Le figaro defended Catholic interests with such zeal as to arouse even the protests of Louis Veuillot. From all these newspapers Le français stood apart, since, not confusing the defense of Catholic interests with those of any dynasty, it had such a following that it could be compared in influence to Le journal des débats; but it then became entangled with the Duke of Broglie in the action of the Conservative Party and declined. Then Msgr. Dupanloup, in three years, gathered the capital necessary to found another newspaper, which was La défense sociale et religieuse (1876-83); the excellent intention of gathering Catholics on a single line of religious defense was not matched by the writers' pens, and the newspaper, after an initial period of prosperity, fell along with Le français, after the ralliement which it had nevertheless helped to bring about.
Meanwhile, from the transformation of a small review of the same name, there was born what is for French Catholics the great religious newspaper of today: La Croix.
Within about twenty years the great majority of Catholic provincial newspapers — Le bien public of Dijon, L'express of Lyon, La liberté catholique of Toulouse and others — abandoned the monarchist line entirely and, accepting the new directives of the encyclical to the French, devoted themselves to the defense of Catholic interests. L'univers, after absorbing Le monde and various vicissitudes undergone with the children and grandchildren of the great Veuillot, disappeared, poorly replaced by La libre parole (1892-1924), and then by Le peuple français (1893-1910).
In the twenty years between the two world wars, Catholics divided their sympathies among frankly Catholic newspapers such as La Croix, with its very numerous provincial editions and the mass of reviews of every kind published by La bonne presse, and newspapers such as L'éclair, La liberté, Le figaro, Le gallois, L'écho de Paris, all respectful of Catholic thought, L'ami du peuple, distinguished in the struggle against communism, and other local ones. After La démocratie of Marc Sangnier, the newspaper that best prepared the new times was L'anbe (1932) of François Gay and Gaston Tessier, a newspaper of frankly Christian and patriotic spirit, and at the same time democratic and trade-unionist. Before 1940 there existed in France 56 Catholic dailies, all with local circulation (except La Croix of Paris) and united in certain "trusts" with a vast capillary organization for distribution; but in general the French Catholic press, apart from some momentary exception, has never managed through its dailies to exercise on society the influence that it has instead exercised through its bold and profound monthly reviews.
In Austria the first Catholic daily was Das Vaterland (1860-1912); others of a regional character then arose, numbering 12 in 1935. The whole complex drew inspiration from the Christian social movement led by Baron Karl von Vogelsang, founder of Der Priusverein for social works and of Der Priusverein for the press. In 1894 Die Reichspost was founded, which, well edited, took first place among the Catholic press and a notable place in Austrian Catholic journalism; its most celebrated director was the State Councillor Friedrich Funder, under whose direction the newspaper acquired great importance also in the political field. A characteristic newspaper was Das kleine Volksblatt, a very illustrated popular organ. Very widespread was the Catholic weekly Tiroler Volksbote, founded in 1898 in Innsbruck, suppressed by the Nazis, and revived after the liberation (1945) under the title Der Volksbote.
In Belgium there existed Catholic dailies even before 1830, the year of its constitution as an independent state; the oldest newspaper in Belgium, Le courrier de l'Escaut, is a Catholic daily; but the first great religious and political daily was La gazette de Liège (1840), directed by a dynasty of journalists, the Demarteaus. After 1860 the Catholic press received a broader impulse: in 1884 Le patriote was born and, after the Rerum novarum, L'avenir social of Carton de Wiart. The greatest importance, however, was had by La libre Belgique, the newspaper most loved by Belgian Catholics, which continued to appear clandestinely even during the German occupation of 1914-1918. Pronounced regionalism and linguistic difference have meant that in Belgium there have always been numerous local dailies; about half of the circulation of the entire Belgian press is accounted for by Catholic dailies.
In Czechoslovakia, before the Second World War, there were 6 Catholic dailies in Bohemia and Slovakia, one in Subcarpathian Russia; moreover, the Polish and German minorities each had one; the most important were Lidové Listy in Prague, Die deutsche Presse, also in Prague, and the Slovak in Bratislava.
In Germany, Catholics had their first organ in 1860, and it was Die hölische Blätter of Cologne, which later became Die hölische Volkszeitung; many other local organs followed, gathered into two "trusts": Der Zeno Konzern in Münster, which controlled 28 newspapers of northwestern Germany, and Die Verbo, in Friedrichshafen, which controlled 19 in northern Bavaria. In 1870, at the same time as the Prussian Zentrumspartei, the major German religious-political organ was born, Die Germania, which fought for the same goal as the "Center": to protect the freedom of the Church and the confessional school and to secure for Catholics their freedom independently of the will of an occasional parliamentary majority. When the Nazi regime attacked, and then suppressed, the Catholic press in the Reich, it counted 61 dailies, about twenty of which had a circulation of more than 20,000 copies; the Augustinus Verein oversaw their distribution and development.
In England there were no Catholic dailies, because of the curious conception of the press that prevails there; indeed, a newspaper without a political color is inconceivable there; but Catholics do not have a party of their own, since they militate indifferently in any of the three traditional parties: Conservative, Liberal and Labour, none of which is anti-Catholic; therefore they have no dailies of their own, but only a few weeklies, which are, moreover, very well made and widely circulated.
In Holland, on the other hand, although Catholics are barely half the population, the Catholic press is very widely circulated and represents half of the total; before the war, around the Maasbode (1878) of Rotterdam, a large, well-made and very widely circulated newspaper, and the Tijd (1848), there were as many as thirty local dailies.
In Poland, before the Second World War, there were as many as 53 Catholic dailies, of which only the Kurier Warsawski was really important; but there was also a school of Catholic journalism and a Catholic news agency.
Spain was in the past very rich in newspapers and still has one of the oldest, El diario de Barcelona, a Catholic paper founded in 1792; but in general Spanish newspapers have in the past been very lively, with small circulations and short lives; among the oldest, El católico (1840-70) and La España (1848-1868) deserve to be remembered; among those still published, El siglo futuro (1875), El correo catalano (1875) and La voz de Valencia (1892). At the beginning of the century the most important newspapers were born, which are also still published: La gazeta del Norte (1901) in Bilbao, El noticiero de Zaragoza (1900), El debate of Madrid with its associated newspapers in various provinces, L'A.B.C. in Madrid. El debate has a flourishing school of Catholic journalism, the only one in all of Spain.
In Switzerland the press also struggled to win for Catholics the place that is their due in a non-Catholic State; between 1830 and 1870 the Catholic newspapers had precisely this task, and they were Das Vaterland (which is still published) in Lucerne, founded in 1833 under the title Die Luzerner Zeitung, La voix catholique (1847), La gazette de Fribourg (1849), L'ami du peuple (1864). After 1870, through the impulse of Mermillod (later cardinal), all Catholic activities in Switzerland received new impetus, and with them the press; there were born what are still today the major Swiss newspapers: the Liberté (1871) in Fribourg, Die Ostschweiz (1873), Le courrier de Genève, Il giornale del popolo in Lugano, Die neue Zürcher Nachrichten and ten other newspapers of a local character.
In Luxembourg, the larger of the two existing dailies is Catholic, Das luxemburger Wort (1848); in Portugal Catholics have Nocidades and three other dailies; Ireland has no Catholic dailies, but the leading daily, The Irish Independent, is run by Catholics.
The European countries now subject to Soviet domination had their religious and political organs: Hungary had the very widely circulated Nemzeti Újság (1921) of Budapest and various other dailies born and supported by the "Pazmany" organization for Catholic writers and journalists; Lithuania had the Rytas; in Yugoslavia the Catholic press was Croatian or Slovenian; the Croats, after various vicissitudes, had preserved the Hrvatska Straza (born as Rijecke Novine in Fiume in 1911 and transferred to Zagreb in 1914); the Slovenes had the Slovence, founded in 1873, and the Slovenski dom, founded in 1936.
In America, the United States has never had any Catholic dailies other than a small newspaper of local importance, The catholic daily tribune of Dubuque (Iowa), and a few newspapers for emigrants not in the English language, but a great many periodical publications, to which the Plenary Council of Baltimore (1884) gave great impetus; even more effective was the establishment in 1919 of the N.C.W.C. news service, which supplies Catholic news to a great number of American and European periodicals.
Canada had its first Catholic daily in 1882, and it was L'étendard in Trois Rivières; then the present French-language Catholic dailies were born: L'action catholique (1907) in Québec, Le devoir (1910) in Montréal and Le droit (1913) in Ottawa.
In Argentina, after the dailies of the 19th century that actively defended religion, El pueblo (1900) arose, which is the largest Catholic daily in all of America.
In the other Republics of Latin America, Catholic dailies of no great importance are published in Venezuela (La religión, Columna and Diario católico), in Ecuador (the Debate), in Bolivia (l'Alas), in Nicaragua (the Diario nicaraguense).
In the Arab States the few dailies published there are all in the hands of Catholics, without, however, being properly Catholic organs. China had before the war the Yi-Shih-Pao in Tientsin; India the The catholic herald, and the Belgian Congo the Courier d'Afrique in Leopoldville.
III. CATHOLIC JOURNALISM TODAY
The upheaval brought about everywhere by the Second World War was not without consequences for journalism either, though not a deep one. In the Anglo-Saxon countries and in the countries that remained on the margins of the war — apart from the restrictions imposed by the shortage of paper due to the difficulty of manufacturing cellulose and the contraction of international transport — everything remained as before. Conversely, in the countries that passed under Soviet domination — Poland, Lithuania, Romania, Czechoslovakia, Bulgaria, Hungary, Albania — and also in Yugoslavia, all the press that exists is governmental, as is characteristic of totalitarian regimes; in such countries, naturally, there is no longer any trace of a Catholic press, whether daily or of any other periodicity. In the democratic countries one notices a shift of the press toward the political and social currents known as of the "left."
In Italy almost all the newspapers of the Fascist period resumed publication with slight changes of title and, naturally, with a changed spirit. The Catholic dailies are among the very few that had no reason to change their titles, since they had not compromised themselves — or only to a minimal degree — with Fascism, and none with that of the "social republic." They number eight, besides L'osservatore romano (editor Giuseppe Dalla Torre), which continues to be printed in Vatican City and which during the war published, out of the impartiality of the Holy See, the bulletins of both sides, suspending their publication entirely from June 10, 1940 (Italy's entry into the war) until June 6, 1944 (the entry of the Allies into Rome). In Rome Il quotidiano is published (editor Federico Alessandrini), derived from the Avvenire, which by its own spontaneous decision changed its title; in Bologna L'avvenire d'Italia (editor Raimondo Manzini); in Milan L'Italia (editor Msgr. Ernesto Pisoni); in Genoa Il nuovo cittadino (editor Fr. Eugenio Badino); in Como L'ordine (editor Fr. Giuseppe Brusadelli); in Bergamo L'eco di Bergamo (editor Fr. Andrea Spada); in Trento Il popolo trentino (editor Flaminio Piccoli); in Cagliari Il quotidiano sardo (editor Mariano Pintus); unlike what happened with the Italian People's Party, to which the Catholic dailies adhered by accepting its discipline, they have remained independent of Christian Democracy while supporting its work; they have instead accepted their connection with the central bodies of Catholic Action, while preserving their own editorial and administrative autonomy; for the service from Rome (political and religious) they have set up a single office. Christian Democracy has its own organs, edited by Catholic journalists, who naturally accept in everything the discipline of the political party, while spreading and defending Christian thought.
In France the war produced even deeper upheavals, and few are the newspapers that have kept their mastheads; among others La Croix, which has resumed its function as the flagship of Catholic journalism, and L'Aube, which has become the organ of the M. R. P. Other dailies not expressly Catholic are nonetheless widely followed by Catholics, such as Le figaro, to which F. Mauriac contributes.
In Germany there are very many dailies printed in the two Republics, but only one Catholic: Das ausburger Tagesblatt (1948).
In Belgium, to the Catholic dailies of before the war has been added Le métropole of Antwerp, a small newspaper that has greatly developed.
In Holland too a new newspaper has been added to the Tijd and the Maasbode: the Volkskrant of Amsterdam.
International organizations. The connecting bodies in journalism are the news agencies for newspapers and the associations for journalists. Catholics have not neglected these two sectors. The Catholic news agencies were, before the Second World War, 19: the most important were the N.C.W.C., the News service and the Fides; the first, an emanation of the Catholic episcopate of the United States to "promote, develop and assist the Catholic press in the United States," is acquiring ever greater influence and distributes thousands of publications throughout the world with millions of copies of circulation, news, services, articles, photographs, etc.; the Fides, an emanation of the Congregation of Propaganda Fide, sends out to the Catholic press bulletins in several languages containing extensive missionary news; the Congregation for the Eastern Church has organized its own agency, "Eastern Church Information Service" (SICO), which indeed sends out news concerning the Eastern Christianities, both Catholic and dissident. An international organization for press information is the "Pro Deo" Information Center (CIP), which has connections with various parts of the world and sends out Catholic and miscellaneous news according to its own ideological criteria.
The international Catholic organization of journalists is threefold. In 1927 in Paris, at the urging of René Delforge, director of Vers l'avenir of Namur, the "Bureau international des journalistes catholiques" was founded, now become "Fédération internationale," as a link among similar national bodies for the defense of common interests. In 1928, on the occasion of the Catholic press exhibition in Cologne, on the initiative of Julius Stocky, director of Die kölnische Volkszeitung, the "Commission permanente des éditeurs et directeurs des journaux catholiques" was established for cooperation among newspapers and agencies; in 1930 in Brussels, on the occasion of the first world congress of the Catholic press, the third body was instituted, which links the other two without impairing their autonomy, namely the "Union internationale de la presse catholique," a federation that groups together organizations and individuals; its statute was approved in Rome in 1936 by the second International Congress of Catholic Journalists. This Congress was of particular importance because it was held during the universal Exposition of the Catholic press, convened in the Vatican by Pius XI to commemorate the 75th anniversary of L'osservatore romano; the Catholic press of the whole world took part in the exposition and in the various meetings and congresses held there, except for National Socialist Germany and Soviet Russia. Among the international bodies the most efficient and continuous was the secretariat of the "Commission permanente," directed by the Dutchman Henry Hoeben, who, through Die katholische Wereldpost of Breda, exercised a broad influence on the press of all countries, especially in the struggle against National Socialism and Communism; during the German occupation of the Netherlands in 1940 the Breda center was occupied by the Germans and Dr. Hoeben was interned in reprisal; he died in a concentration camp on 28 Feb. 1942. After the war relations among all these bodies were resumed at the third International Congress of the Catholic press, held in Rome (16-19 Feb. 1950) on the occasion of the Holy Year; journalists from 32 countries took part; the three fundamental bodies were reconstituted, and in addition a permanent secretariat and a Union of Press Agencies. Count G. Dalla Torre was confirmed as president of the International Union of the Catholic Press. In almost all countries there exist national associations of Catholic journalists; in Italy, after various attempts that came to nothing, in 1940 a "Pia Unione" was erected (since during Fascism professional associations could not be constituted, except for the single syndicates), which operated actively until 1943, that is, until the death of its founder, Mario Luzzi. In 1950 the Association of Italian Catholic Journalists was finally constituted, which adheres to Catholic Action through the Movimento laureati. Schools of journalism exist in various Catholic universities; Rome has a most flourishing one: the international University "Pro Deo."
IV. JOURNALISTIC TECHNIQUE AND PROFESSIONAL MORALITY
The fundamental code of the journalist's professional morality remains that passage of the encyclical Rerum omnium (Jan. 26, 1923: AAS, 5 [1923], p. 49), with which Pius XI declared St. Francis de Sales patron of "all those Catholics who by the publication of newspapers or other writings illustrate, promote and defend Christian doctrine." That passage says, and it dispenses with any commentary: "First of all let them study with the greatest diligence and attain, as far as they can, to a possession of Catholic doctrine; let them beware of falling short of the truths, nor, under the pretext of avoiding offense to adversaries, weaken or conceal them; let them take care for the very form and elegance of speech, and strive to express their thoughts with clarity and adornment of words, in such a way that readers take delight in the truth; and if it should be a case of combating adversaries, let them indeed know how to refute errors and resist the wickedness of the perverse, but in such a way as to make known that they are animated by uprightness and above all moved by charity." These concepts, developed even more fully by the same Pontiff in his address to Catholic journalists of June 27, 1929, and by Card. Gasparri in his letter to Count Dalla Torre, president of the Association of Catholic Writers and Journalists "St. Francis de Sales" (Feb. 4, 1925), say in summary how noble the Church considers the profession of the Catholic journalist, almost a mission.
It is certain that today's journalism has need of being recalled to the foundations of Christian morality, while freedom of the press, conceived in an ever broader sense, loosens the brakes that few and scant laws place upon it and that the very rapidity of its production cycle barely allows time to observe day by day. The duration of the production cycle of one edition of a newspaper of four or six pages (as is the case with most newspapers in Italy, in France, and in the various smaller countries, whereas in America newspapers are made up of various sections, each of numerous pages) can vary from 4 to 6 hours depending on the type of newspaper, the abundance of its means and the number of editors at its disposal. Today's journalism would not be what it is if it could not avail itself of vast and rapid information, whose truthfulness it is not always easy and often impossible to verify, and of a technical-industrial complex that has reached a high degree of perfection and for that very reason tends to dominate the journalist's intellectual work. The press agencies, which are the principal source of news, pour every day, and above all every night, into the editorial offices an enormous quantity of news and information, of which each newspaper uses approximately a third. The news report supplied by these agencies must be elaborated by the newspaper editors together with the information that each daily receives from its own informants and correspondents, then passed to the print shop after a swift review by the department heads (domestic, foreign, parliamentary, local news, religious, sports, financial, etc., depending on the newspaper) and set in lines of lead; the flat pages of mechanical composition are within a few minutes reproduced stereoscopically as semi-cylindrical one-piece pages and placed on the cylinders of the rotary presses; these very rapid and precise printing machines are each capable of turning out tens of thousands of copies per hour. It is understandable that this work, condensed into a short span of time and under the pressure of competition, is not always checked as it should be, and carried out with the necessary precautions. Nevertheless in every country precise legal provisions repress the abuses of freedom of the press and of information, which moreover can have its first check and limit only in the journalist's own conscience. - See plate XXXV.
Bibliography10 works
Enrico Lucatello