Are Catholic Online News Sites Being Censored ?

An interesting sequel to yesterday's post ( 8th July) on  reporting of  Bishop Dowling' speech from the US Catholic  here  here  and here.


Also a very courageous comment is made today (9th July) from Fr. James Martin S.J (who I respect ), in response to the apparent machinations going on when he said this :

"Ironically, this whole convoluted episode proves the point of Bishop Dowling's address: talking freely in the church today-even if you're a bishop-is dangerous.  The "pressure to conform," as he called it, is immense.  And the church suffers because of it."

From US Catholic

"Two recent events have raised the specter of online censorship, or at least of undue pressure by Catholic Church officials on Catholic news organizations.
Today the British-based Independent Catholic News, a daily online Catholic news site set up by a group of Catholic journalists, apparently pulled down the reprint of a June speech by South African Bishop Kevin Dowling it had published yesterday.
That event followed on the heels of an incident in May when the Austrian Catholic news agency Kathpress was pressured to remove from its website a report on a speech by Vienna's Cardinal Christoph Schönborn. The Kathpress report on Schönborn's outspoken criticism of Cardinal Angelo Sodano and other Vatican shortcomings
Today, (9th July) when I checked the ICN link I posted yesterday it had indeed been removed and I too got the message

"Error accessing this article information. It may have been deleted."
However I have reposted it and it now seems OK.

 I find the last paragraph of the US Catholic article that says this rather more ominous statement

"As for the removal of the Schönborn article from the kathpress website in early May, the Austrian newspaper Die Presse has reported that "inside sources" in Rome attributed the removal to "discreet counsel" kathpress received from the Vatican press office."
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1 comment:

colkoch said...

If sources inside the Vatican truly think they can somehow censor the inter net they have slipped into true paranoid delusions.