Catholics need to engage the culture through the secular media. (you may be the only authentic voice of truth)

Going forth into the “night” of our culture

By Thomas M. Doran

Catholics need to engage the culture through the secular media. 

Here's why and how.

Pope Francis recently addressed to the Brazilian bishops, saying, “The two disciples have left Jerusalem. They are leaving behind the 'nakedness' of God. They are scandalized by the failure of the Messiah in whom they had hoped and who now appeared utterly vanquished, humiliated, even after the third day. Here we have to face the difficult mystery of those people who leave the Church, who, under the illusion of alternative ideas, now think that the Church – their Jerusalem – can no longer offer them anything meaningful and important. So they set off on the road alone, with their disappointment. Perhaps the Church appeared too weak, perhaps too distant from their needs, perhaps too poor to respond to their concerns, perhaps too cold, perhaps too caught up with itself, perhaps a prisoner of its own rigid formulas, perhaps the world seems to have made the Church a relic of the past, unfit for new questions; perhaps the Church could speak to people in their infancy but not to those come of age. It is a fact that nowadays there are many people like the two disciples of Emmaus; not only those looking for answers in the new religious groups that are sprouting up, but also those who already seem godless, both in theory and in practice.

"Faced with this situation, what are we to do?

"We need a Church unafraid of going forth into their night. We need a Church capable of meeting them on their way. We need a Church capable of entering into their conversation. We need a Church able to dialogue with those disciples who, having left Jerusalem behind, are wandering aimlessly, alone, with their own disappointment, disillusioned by a Christianity now considered barren, fruitless soil, incapable of generating meaning.”

This is what we, not just bishops and priests, are called to do by Christ and by his Church.

One of the arenas where this “night” is darkest is the secular media. Many Catholics, discouraged or scandalized by what they see in the media, choose to ignore it, as Tolkien’s hobbits ignored the shadow in the south. Believers often retract into the shells of their parish communities, or family, friends, and media they trust. Unfortunately, without engaging and influencing the culture – changing minds and hearts – these “Shires” may also be overrun.

For those Catholics who, by training or aptitude, are capable of engaging the culture through the secular media, avoidance is not the answer. In a word, you may be the only authentic voice of truth that a lapsed Catholic, agnostic, or materialist hears.

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