3 November 2014 1 Challenges Facing Print Media In India Today! (A PERSPECTIVE) Dear Friends, It is good to be here at this National Convention of the Indian Catholic Press Association (ICPA). I want to thank Fr. Alfonso Elengikal, the President of the ICPA, Mr. Jose Vincent, the Secretary of ICPA and all others concerned for inviting me to share with you some perspectives on the challenges facing the print media today. I will of course focus on the theme of this Convention, “PROPHETIC CHALLENGES BEFORE MEDIA TODAY”. At the outset, I would like to emphasize two points: i. that the printed word plays a significant and defining role in the Indian sub-continent today ii. that being engaged in the print media is no longer an option for us, but a mandate CHALLENGES Having said this let me focus on some of the challenges that the print media faces in the changing context of India today. (In order to ensure an economy of words, I will in the remainder of this sharing use the very general term ‘media’ even though this Convention focuses on Catholics en- Fr. Cedric Prakash sj, delivering the talk on gaged in the print-media) 'Challenges Facing Print Media In India Today!' What then are some of the major challenges which the will easily reveal that they belong to one or the other of the media in India faces today? big corporate houses. Corporations (be they national or multi-nationals), we are all aware, have their own agenda. · The Corporatisation Of The Media They are determined by the ideology of that particular If there is one single major concern which the media in corporation, by profit-making and in most instances, they India faces today, it is the way it has been corporatised. A would not want to disturb the ‘status quo’ or to rock the systematic study of all the big newspapers in the country boat. When media is taken over by such houses, the end- game is blatantly clear: our minds, our thought-processes are determined in a particular way. Royal Christian Family · The Commercialisation Of The Media In our Centre ‘PRASHANT’, we focus on human rights, GET-TOGETHER justice and peace and a key dimension of our work is the scanning and documenting from eighteen major daily newspapers in English, Gujarati and Hindi. It is simply of Brides and Grooms unbelievable that these past few days, in several newspa- pers five and even seven pages are devoted to full-page advertisements. The advertisements are varied: of major sales and discounts; the announcements of brand new products and of course, the propaganda of political parties (mainly the BJP). These advertisements certainly cost a pretty sum; when one gives importance to such crass commercialisation, then the newspaper loses its very heart for Details Contact: and soul. Remember the big talk of “black money?” 99, Perin Nariman Street, 1st Floor, Near GPO., Fort, Mumbai 400001 · The Co-option Of The Media Tel.: 022 - 22693578, 22654924 Corporatisation and commercialisation of the media have Email: [email protected], [email protected] plenty to do with its co-option. So in a way, this becomes (Contd.. on p. 7) 2 3 November 2014 Advt. TTAdvt. ariffariffariff Over all size 21.5 cms x 27cms O Print area 18 cms x 25.5 cms A WEEKLY FAMILY FAVOURITE Full pg. back Colour (19 cms x 24 cms) Rs. 15,000 Center spread colour(39 cms x 23.5 cms Rs. 15,000 Vol.23 No.44 November 3, 2014 Rs.5/- Full pg. inside Cover colour(18 cms x 24 cms) Rs. 10,000 99, Perin Nariman Street, Fort, Mumbai - 400 001. Full pg. inner colour (18 cms x 24 cms) Rs. 8,000 Tel: 2269 35 78 / 2265 49 24 : 2264 0996 Half pg. 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(1 year The Secular Citizen FREE) Contents Couples seeking pg. 2 - Challenges Facing Print Media In India Today! pg. 3 - Couples seeking annul- annulments should not be ments should not be 'held hos- tage' to the past. ‘held hostage' to the past pg. 6 - Reader's Views major dispute at the recently concluded Extraor pg. 8 - Eucharistic Miracles Justify dinary Synod on the Family, described by Tokyo Faith And Belief AArchbishop Peter Takeo Okada as "white hot", pg 10 - Thank you CM, for Rejecting concerned the Church's practice of denying the Eucharist Somashekara Inquiry Com- to those who have remarried following a divorce. mission Report In a commentary sent to the Katorikku Shimbun, pg 11 - Views on News Japan's national Catholic weekly, the archbishop said pg 15 - Understanding The MBA that "the participating bishops demonstrated one of two BY FR WILLIAM GRIMM pg 17 - Know the Glossary of Eco- orientations. One was the desire to be pastoral, providing nomic Terms comfort, encouragement, help and hope to families worn down by pain.... On the other hand, some stressed the necessity of deepening the commitment to pg 19 - Inspiration! and conveying the teaching of Christ." pg 20 - Matrimonials Those who opposed relaxing the rule cited the command of Jesus (Mark 10:10-12, modified and softened in Matthew) saying that remarriage following divorce is adultery. Among those hierarchs who most vehemently insist upon literal obser- Subscriptions Rate: vance of Jesus's words (though Jesus is never recorded to have spoken at all of either allowing or denying people access to the Eucharist) are some cardinals One year (anywhere in India) Rs. 250 whose photos can be found on the Internet showing them wearing the cappa Three years (anywhere in India) Rs. 700 magna, a red cape with a hood lined with ermine or silk that was shortened from Five years (anywhere in India) Rs. 1000 15 meters to seven (49 feet to 25 feet) in 1952 and generally disappeared from One year (outside India) Rs. 2500 ecclesiastical haberdashery after Vatican II. Originally, the great length was intended to cover the rear end of the horse as a bishop or cardinal rode. E-paper Edition Reportedly, such a cape costs several thousand dollars — a far cry from sent anywhere in the world (by email) swaddling clothes. One year Rs. 600 or US $ 15 Clearly, those cardinals have found a way to reconcile their fashion sense Two years Rs. 1000 or US $ 25 with Jesus' stern warning against ostentatious garb for religious leaders who Thank you CM, for Rejecting impose burdens on others (Matthew 23:2-7). Cover : Apparently, they think that while some verses of Scripture must be taken Somashekara Inquiry Com- literally, others may be pursued as optional ideals for the heroically holy, some mission Report (Letter on pg. 10) (Contd.. on p. 4) 3 November 2014 3 (Contd.. from p. 3) can be entertained as mere sugges- tions and some should be ignored. Pope calls for abolishment They presumably reserve to themselves the authority to decide to which cat- egory a particular Scriptural injunction of capital punishment, belongs. Some who seek to allow people whose marriages have failed to once life imprisonment again share fully the life of the Catholic ope Francis called for abolition their liberty. And this, I connect with life community point to the practice of the of the death penalty as well as imprisonment," he said. "Life imprison- Orthodox Church, where a period of life imprisonment, and de- ment is a hidden death penalty." penitence may be followed by a sec- P nounced what he called a "penal popu- The pope noted that the Vatican ond or even third marriage. lism" that promises to solve society's recently eliminated life inprisonment However, this ignores the fact that problems by punishing crime instead from its own penal code. sometimes marriages fail without any- of pursuing social justice. According to the Catechism of one being at fault. Rather than repen- "It is impossible to imagine that the Catholic Church, cited by Pope tance, what might be needed is a pe- states today cannot make use of an- Francis in his talk, "the traditional teach- riod or even a ceremony of mourning other means than capital punishment ing of the church does not exclude for the hopes that have evaporated, for to defend peoples' lives from an unjust recourse to the death penalty, if this is the shared life that has for whatever aggressor," the pope said Oct. 23 in a the only possible way of effectively reason come to an end. meeting with representatives of the defending human lives against the un- Men and women grow and change International Association of Penal Law. just aggressor," but modern advances throughout their lives, and the couple "All Christians and people of good in protecting society from dangerous that spoke vows in the past can — and will are thus called today to struggle criminals mean that "cases in which do — become different people from not only for abolition of the death pen- the execution of the offender is an those who were joined together in alty, whether it be legal or illegal and in absolute necessity are very rare, if not matrimony.