Catholic Review

Inspiring the Archdiocese of Baltimore

An empty Catholic News Service newsroom is pictured at the headquarters of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops in Washington May 4, 2022. The USCCB announced to staff May 4 a dramatic reorganization of its communications department, including the closure of the Washington and New York offices of CNS. (CNS photo/Bob Roller)

Navigating a changing media landscape


By
Catholic Review Filed Under: Amen, Amen Gunty Commentary, Commentary, Feature, Journalism

In an independent survey conducted late last year, almost two-thirds of readers of the Catholic Review said they want more local news. More than a third also want more national and world Catholic news. More than half in both those categories want the same – so almost nine in 10 clearly value news from outside this archdiocese. 

The survey, conducted for the Archdiocese of Baltimore and the Catholic Review by the Simpson Scarborough research firm, showed a high satisfaction with the magazine, with 62 percent rating it eight, nine or 10 on a 10-point scale.

When asked if the magazine was available online only and not as a printed, hard copy, 75 percent said they would read the Catholic Review less or significantly less (nearly half said significantly less).

This is a photo of the newsroom of Catholic News Service’s predecessor, NC News Service, in the 1950s. (CNS)

That’s why the news hit us very hard when it broke May 4 – reported first in a tweet and later by Catholic News Service itself – that the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops plans to shut down domestic operations of CNS at the end of 2022. The Catholic Review, in all its forms over the decades, has relied on CNS to deliver quality, balanced Catholic news from around the country and the world to our readers. 

Coverage of the Supreme Court and Capitol Hill from CNS’ Washington headquarters, along with movie reviews, popular columnists and other inspiring features, will no longer be available. We are grateful the CNS Rome bureau will remain open, but other international coverage is still up in the air. 

The decision to close Catholic News Service’s domestic operations is a tragic one, and ill-advised. The journalists at CNS have been dedicated, faithful and essential to the news operations of many Catholic publications not only in the United States but also around the English-speaking world. I know many of these journalists personally and professionally and they are some of the best in the business.

In the meantime, we are not sitting still. As members of the Catholic Media Association, we are already trying to find ways to develop a new distribution method for news from around North America. Cardinal John Foley, once editor of the Catholic Standard and Times in Philadelphia and later president of the Pontifical Council for Social Communications, said often that if Catholic News Service did not exist, we would have to invent it. 

The need to find a solution to continuing the movie reviews is much more urgent. The bishops’ film office which has produced movie reviews since it was the Legion of Decency will shut down at the end of July. John Mulderig, assistant director for media reviews at CNS, and his colleagues have been very helpful in warning readers away from bad movies – not just morally offensive, but cinematically bad – and steering them to those movies that uplift the human character. We hope to find a way to continue bringing that kind of information directly to you via our website and e-newsletter.

We know the media landscape is changing. We live through it every day. When I started in the Catholic Press 40 years ago, we used typewriters to create our stories, and then early Radio Shack computers. Fast forward, and now we produce stories and take photos and videos on a phone we carry in our pockets, as well as on computers on our desks or our laps. 

Even as all this has changed, we realize that Catholic Review readers really want the magazine in their home. A third spend more than 30 minutes each month and two-thirds keep the magazine in their home for more than a week.

We know that our magazine and the news we report helps you stay informed about what’s going on in the church and the world from the perspective of faith. 

We are grateful to our colleagues from Catholic News Service who have helped us with that mission over the years and we pledge to you that we will continue that mission no matter what.

Email Christopher Gunty at editor@CatholicReview.org

Read More Commentary

Copyright © 2022 Catholic Review Media

Print Print