Posted on 12/13/2010 6:53:26 AM PST by mlizzy
November 3, 2010 (LifeSiteNews.com) – The internet has provided a means for orthodox Catholics to skirt or otherwise defeat the blockading of an orthodox voice in Western media, said Michael Voris, creator and public face of RealCatholicTV, an internet-based apologetics organization, in an interview with the Associated Press this week.
AP’s Rachel Zoll quoted John Allen, the Vatican correspondent for the liberal National Catholic Reporter, who has coined the term “Taliban Catholic” to describe orthodox Catholics who insist that the Catholic Church’s hierarchy and administration toe the line of authentic Catholic teaching, especially on life and family issues. Liberal critics such as Allen suggest that these lay pioneers of internet-based alternative media are stepping out of line, attempting to “purge dissenters” from the Church [which is overloaded with self-excommunicated “dissenters”].
But Michael Voris told LifeSiteNews.com today that he and his colleagues, as well as a handful of other groups like Austria’s Gloria TV, are doing only what they are called to do by virtue of their baptism.
He told Rachel Zoll, “We’re no more engaged in a witch hunt than a doctor excising a cancer .... We’re just shining a spotlight on people who are Catholics who do not live the faith.”
Michael Voris started his career in mainstream television, and after a conversion, started St. Michael’s Media, and then RealCatholicTV as a means of spreading Catholic teaching in a Church that he says has given up doing so at the official level. [So say we all!]
He told LSN, “We move on the assumption that the vast majority of adult Catholics simply don’t know their faith because it never was presented to them. They might have a piece of it here or there, but for the most part they don’t understand 90 per cent. They haven’t been taught.”
Voris spoke … of his work, from its start just two years ago. “We have a circulation that would make any diocesan newspaper envious. When a video has finished its run on Youtube, it’s been seen maybe 15,000 times.
“My hope is that this large group is able to tune in and say ‘I never heard that before’.”
The project is starting to bear fruit in conversions and reversions to the faith. Voris says that his office constantly receives emails, phone calls and letters from viewers who say they have learned more about the Catholic faith from his work than they ever did from the often very liberal official Church in especially most English speaking nations and Europe.
But his intention has never been to exclude or “purge” anyone. “A bunch of people who want to be dissenters aren’t going to like it,” he said. “But it’s not our goal to squeeze anyone out.”
Voris was not so gentle about the Catholic hierarchy, however: “Bishops are a different story from the laity who aren’t catechized.”
“The current disaster in the Church is the fault of the bishops and the priests who have failed to teach the faith. Lay Catholics must realize that in many cases they’re not hearing the fullness of the truth. And that’s the bishops’ fault. They need to be called out.”
Bishops in many nations, he said, have “refused” to say “uncomfortable” things about birth control or homosexuality. He pointed to the current move in several parts of the Catholic world to reduce the number of days outside of Sundays that Catholics are under a serious obligation to attend Mass.
“The constant stream, the constant message, is that being Catholic is fourth or fifth on the list of importance in life.”
The work of groups like RealCatholicTV garnered criticism from Terrence C. Donilon, the spokesman for the archdiocese of Boston, who told AP, “The lack of civility is very disturbing.” [Can it compare with loss of civilization?]
This accusation of a “lack of civility” or “a lack of charity” is becoming common for Catholic officialdom to level at Catholic internet activists. It was reiterated in 2009 by a member of the Vatican’s Pontifical Council for Social Communications.
During a Vatican-sponsored conference in Rome last year, Fr. Thomas Rosica, the head of Canada’s Salt and Light Television, suggested the creation of “some sort of framework or guidelines” for bloggers and other internet sites that are pressing for a greater emphasis on doctrinal orthodoxy from Church leaders and institutions. There has to be “some form of oversight provided by the Church,” Rosica said. [First we locate and identify the Church!]
A similar suggestion of authoritarian, top-down control was also made in the UK by the Catholic bishops where a small group of bloggers, made up mainly of ordinary diocesan priests, lay students and housewives, has been a thorn in the side of a hierarchy heavily dominated by the left.
Last June Bishop Gabino Zavala, the head of the U.S. bishops’ conference communications committee, said that there is “consistent agreement” between bishops that the orthodox Catholic blogs and websites are “most alarming.”
“We are particularly concerned about blogs that engage in attacks and hurtful, judgmental language. We are very troubled by blogs and other elements of media that assume the role of Magisterium and judge others in the Church. Such actions shatter the communion of the Church that we hold so precious.” [A replacement for the Communion of Saints, in which we are one with our forebears?]
Those involved in the alternative Catholic media projects say they expect opposition to grow the more they increase their influence in the Church and secular politics through savvy use of the internet.
The “Taliban Catholic” term was leveled recently by the UK’s Austen Ivereigh against the head of the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children, John Smeaton, who is considered one of the most effective pro-life leaders in the world.
Ivereigh, in the lead-up to the visit of Benedict XVI to Britain, launched a media liaison project that he said would present a more reasoned, measured Catholic voice to media commentators. In an interview, Ivereigh said he had received applications from “Taliban Catholics” but had weeded them out.
Voris, however, noted the irony of the liberals accusing orthodox Catholics of a lack of charity by calling them members of the murderous Islamic Taliban.
“When we say that a person, a public figure, is not living the faith, we’re saying something accurate about what he is [not] doing. But calling faithful Catholics the ‘Taliban’ because they want the bishops to be more faithful is a straightforward slur. [Don’t knock it! It’s high time our detractors were straightforward.]
“We’re not blowing up buildings, we’re not murdering women or cutting people’s heads off. It’s just an insult,” said Voris. [While they revile us they waste no time on reasoned argument. Possible conclusion? Like impossibility?]
[emphasis mine]
I really appreciate Michael Voris' work and support him as much as I can. The line quoted above is spot on! Many bishops and priests abandonned catechesis altogether and left that part of their responsibility up to lay people with liberal agendas and virtually no oversight. I was present at a session where I almost got intoa brawl with the poofter teaching the RCIA class because he said that everything they thought that the Church taught about Mary was wrong. She was not sinless ( guess he never heard of the Immaculate Conception), didn't have a virgin birth, was not assumed into heaven and that Marian apparitions were mostly bunk propogated by insane or mentally deficient peasants! When I complained to the pastor about this I was told that I was out of line for disrupting that class and that I was not an acceptable sponsor for my buddy who was coming into the Church.
We're starting to see a course correction in some of the worst abuses, IMHO, because alot of the pagan hippies who were out to destrroy the Church from within are dying off. We're alos recovering from the near takeover of our seminaries by the Lavendar Mafia. The Church isn't considered an easy and gay friendly job for active gays anymore. People are on to them. Well at least that's my prayer...that faithful Catholics stand up to the insidious gay agenda that has infected our priesthood.
What is that on his head?
Spotlight?
Yes, there does seem to be spotlight. Weird angle.
A bad combover.
Bookmark.
I'm just not convinced that's hair. It looks like something crawled onto his noggin and died. Either that, or he drives a fast convertible IN REVERSE with the top down.
Why not share a photograph of yourself on Free Republic, Alex? For feedback? Most men, by the way, would love to have a mop of hair into their 40s-50s. My FIL’s (he’s 80 now!) has hair as thick as Michael Voris’. Yet only one of my sons inherited the trait.
ROTFL! Michael, is that you?
Most men, by the way, would love to have a mop of hair into their 40s-50s. My FIL’s (he’s 80 now!) has hair as thick as Michael Voris’. Yet only one of my sons inherited the trait.
That's because you and your father took all the genes, and left none for your childen!
Who was that crooked politician with the hair ... Alphonse D’Amato, maybe? One of those northeastern gents.
My husband, who turned 48 yesterday, has his hair shaved in a “#2 buzz,” even shorter than our sons’.
ROTFL! Michael, is that you?Wouldn't that be funny if it was? One time, I put up a post on Randall Terry, and people were putting up some inaccurate stuff that was cruel precisely *because* it was inaccurate, and Randall Terry signed up on Free Republic to straighten them out.
If Mr. Voris calls any of us spades, can we call his hair guinea-pig pelts?
I had to look up “#2 buzz cut.” Yes, that is short! How often does he get it cut to maintain?
About once a month.
And I don’t care for Mr. Voris’s style. It’s not that I think what he says is incorrect, but it’s not the type of communication I care for. To be totally honest, I didn’t think there was anything wrong with him until you posted this endorsement from Hutton Gibson.
Wrong by association? Yipes! And yes, his style is strident; maybe he’ll change some in time.
Jim Traficant?
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