Catholic Publicity
Williams, Michael
CATHOLIC PUBLICITY By MICHAEL WILLIAMS Last week Mr. Williams analyzed the present status and uses of publicity. The discussion is now brought round to the religious uses of what is termed...
...According to his definition, propaganda could be described as "the methods by which you spread or advance your cult, school of opinion, ism or philosophy -in 1913 it meant that and that alone...
...The pernicious maxim that you may do evil for what you hold to be a good purpose (the infamous doctrine that "the end justifies the means") never wreaked such havoc as it did during and since the world war What men as individuals would never dream of being guilty of was done freely by these very same men on behalf and in the name of their various governments...
...No newspaper or magazine or public speaker publishing or uttering anything concerning Christian Science which from the point of view of that church is misleading, erroneous or hostile, escapes a prompt, systematic and persistent answer...
...Their clip-sheets and news reports reach every editor's desk in America, and a very considerable amount of what these clip-sheets and reports contain finds its way into the secular press or is reflected in the opinions uttered by secular editorial writers...
...The other news-collecting agencies and the owners and editors of our great American newspapers, must be thoroughly convinced of the integrity and honest character of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, because a very wide use is made by the press of the despatches sent out by it...
...In this instance- which is not a solitary one of the kind-the propaganda organization of the Christian Science Church is palpably employing an illegitimate weapon...
...And it must also be granted that, however much we may condemn those movements or organizations whose purposes clearly and unmistakably are in conflict with the laws or institutions of this nation, or of any other nation, there cannot be any proper objection raised to the existence and operations of propaganda organizations working in behalf of such movements and groups as keep within the limits of the law...
...Each one spread poisonous falsehoods about the nations opposed to it in war...
...The news bureau of the National Catholic Welfare Conference cannot give its information to the secular press because that would hurt the Catholic weekly newspapers...
...Where does the Catholic Church figure in this field...
...The Catholic weekly newspapers are read almost solely by Catholics...
...As Mr...
...Eddy to which the Christian Science authorities object...
...This I believe to be particularly true of the Catholic Church in the United States...
...Its work was particularly noteworthy during the recent troubles in Palestine...
...Will Irwin points out in a recent article in Scribner's Magazine, "before the world war the word 'propaganda' held an innocent and dignified meaning...
...It is absolutely necessary to cling to that fundamental fact...
...Only Catholics themselves can adequately remedy the matter...
...Practically speaking, not at all...
...Its despatches from Poland and other parts of the world where Jewish problems are acute appear continually...
...There is published in Boston one of the best edited, best written and most effective of daily newspapers, the Christian Science Monitor...
...but roughly it fits...
...Publicity is the most effective instrument...
...It would be almost superfluous to mention the constant publicity activities of the splendid organizations representing such bodies as the Young Men's Christian Association, the Young Women's Christian Association, the Salvation Army, the Protestant Episcopal Church, the Anti-saloon League, and many others...
...This newspaper has no general circulation, but reaches those who mold and influence public opinion at its source...
...They have professional journalists in their employ, exclusively devoted to the unending task of propaganda...
...Practically every other religious body in the United States is much better equipped than the Catholic Church in this most important matter...
...The important point is the action taken by those who honestly believed themselves to be the victims of ignorance, misrepresentation and prejudice...
...It would result in handing over unlimited control to forces which cannot be trusted with such responsibility...
...From the point of view of the Christian Scientists, this condemnation was unjust because it was based upon ignorance and prejudice...
...The news bureau of the National Catholic Welfare Conference collects and distributes a large amount of well-written, authentic Catholic news and views, but this is almost exclusively for the benefit of the Catholic newspapers...
...IN MY first article, which discussed the more general aspects of the problems of publicity-so sensationally brought to the attention of the public by the Shearer case and the lobby investigation in Washington-I said that my chief purpose was to deal with Catholic publicity, and that I would anticipate the judgment which I believe would have to be given by any competent appraiser of the facts by declaring that American Catholics are most inadequately equipped with proper publicity methods and organization...
...It is no part of my present purpose to inquire into the question of the soundness or the unsoundness of Christian Science...
...It is to maintain and prove this statement that this second article is written...
...Just at present we are witnessing the spectacle of a great publishing house forced to conduct a struggle against the resolute attempt of the Christian Science organization to compel the booksellers not to handle a life of Mrs...
...Catholics, well aware that their Church itself always has been a propaganda organization in the salutary sense of the term, are also aware that their Church for centuries has possessed a highly important special organization, the Congregation of the Propaganda of the Faith, which leads, coordinates and directs the world-wide effort to spread and advance the Catholic religion...
...American Catholics are twenty-five years behind the times they live in, so far as this typically American method of advancing-or even of merely protecting-their own interests is concerned...
...Pierre van Paasen, to Palestine to report at first hand concerning conditions there in a series of extraordinarily able articles...
...But they do not employ it...
...Since they believe in their religion, and so triumphantly prove their faith by the adoption and skilful employment of the power of publicity, they are indeed, as they themselves would say, "demonstrating" the faith that is in them...
...Only a very few of them exert any notable influence on the secular press...
...The subject will not, however, be left dangling thus in the air...
...But as for their usual methods, the publication of a really first-class daily paper of national-indeed of international-influence, and the admirable manner in which their united corps of publicity agents and correspondents work for the propagation of their faith, it seems to me that nothing can be said except words of commendation and praise...
...The discussion is now brought round to the religious uses of what is termed "propaganda," with the Catholic situation as the most important situation...
...When the inevitable exposure of this situation came at last, it is no wonder that justifiable and honest propaganda as well as the false and vicious kind, fell under almost universal condemnation...
...certainly, to American history...
...While, of course, all American Jews are by no means so compactly organized in a religious sense as the Christian Scientists-for modern American Jewry ranges all the way from its centre of strict orthodox believers to the most vague sort of religious views, and some sections have dropped religious views entirely-nevertheless, Jews as Jews, irrespective of their individual religious doctrines, almost universally maintain and practise a common interest in and concern for the problems of their race...
...For any social groupf associated in adherence to principles which they honestly believe to be necessary for the well-being of society, to be driven out of the field by the clamor now being raised against propaganda would be the most unfortunate thing that could happen to society...
...What they did was to turn to propaganda, mainly through publicity...
...There are the Christian Scientists, for a leading example...
...Now, these Catholic newspapers-with one exception, a daily published in Dubuque, Iowa-come out only once a week...
...Twenty-five years ago this organization found itself faced by an almost universal suspicion on the part of the press of the country...
...In every large city today there is an expert publicity agent of Christian Science maintaining constant watch over all the channels by which public opinion is affected or molded...
...Without honest propaganda modern democratic society could not carry on...
...No reader of the daily press during the last few years can have helped but recognize the highly effective operations of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency...
...This organization also publishes a daily newspaper made up of the messages prepared and distributed by it...
...However, since the world war, as Mr...
...No more gigantic example of how a thing" that is innocent and commendable when honestly employed will become dangerous and even destructive when employed dishonestly, has ever been seen than the world war degradation of the idea and the process known as propaganda...
...During the Palestine trouble it sent one of the best-known American newspaper correspondents in Paris, Mr...
...Irwin says, the word propaganda and the process it describes has fallen into almost universal odium because of the notorious dishonesty, and the evil uses made, of "war propaganda...
...They perfected an organization for that purpose which has achieved a success of the first magnitude...
...That "American Catholics are twenty-five years behind the times so far as this method of advancing -or even of merely protecting-their interests is concerned" forms the conclusion...
...Another conspicuous example of effective publicity organization is furnished by our Jewish friends...
...and to spread these lies, all the instruments of publicity: the press, the radio, the stage and the motion picture theatre, the lecture platform, even the pulpit-were employed...
...and, comparatively speaking, only a handful of Catholics at that...
...If ever there was an institution whose history, whose principles, whose culture, whose methods and whose teachings were less known, more maligned or more misunderstood, its name is as yet unknown to history...
...To deal with this matter as clearly and directly as its complex character will permit, we must begin by distinguishing between what is called propaganda and what we may correctly define as publicity...
...The Editors...
...The deplorable results affect all American Catholics, and affect the nation as well...
...Its doctrines were generally condemned...
...Irwin simplifies his definition perhaps excessively...
...In one way or another-as it would be quite easy to prove in detail if space permitted-not only the Catholic Church, but practically all other religious bodies, and all the groupings of mankind into political, economic, literary, philosophical and scientific movements, are similarly organized-more or less adequately-for propaganda in this, the original and proper sense of the definition...
...Nevertheless, in itself it does not deserve condemnation...
...In the current number of the American Mercury, you will find an article in which the expert publicity work carried on for a large number of religious organizations and individual Protestant clergymen in New York City is described at length...
...For the governments of the warring nations undoubtedly were guilty of the sin of deliberate, conscious lying...
...In his next article Mr...
...Williams plans to answer the question: "What can be done about it...
Vol. 11 • November 1929 • No. 3
