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The media

A large part of our work is concerned with monitoring the media who are in the main hostile to the Church’s teaching. Where appropriate, we issue press releases and write letters or phone the TV and radio networks to register our objections and defend our beliefs.

Occasionally, our concerns are listened to but these moments are few and far between. Sadly our letters too are rarely used. However we feel it is important that we persevere and strive to make the truths of our faith known.

Once in a while, we are able to write and congratulate a paper or magazine, a TV or radio network on their coverage of a given event as for instance the death of Pope John Paul II and the election of Pope Benedict XVI.

The committee write “official” letters and make comments on behalf of the Association and members are encouraged to respond in a personal capacity.

 

Letter

The following was sent to the Advertising Standards Authority with copies to The Catholic Herald, The Catholic Times, The Universe, The Tablet and The Daily Telegraph (21st January 2009).

Dear Director

• re ‘There is probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life'.
  
  The implication of the advertisements appearing on buses in London and elsewhere and paid for by, we must assume, anxious atheists, is that those in the Judeo-Christian tradition are less happy than they are.
  
  Since this cannot be stated with certainty, the advertisements are making allegations that cannot be substantiated. It is the equivalent of saying ‘Blogg's beer is the best'. These advertisements have no justification and should be removed.
  
  Why should Jews, Christians and perhaps others be held up to ridicule on public transport, which one cannot avoid, ridicule which is licensed by a body funded by tax-payers to uphold advertising standards?
  
  Incidentally, much research indicates the reverse - that people who believe in a loving Creator God are, unsurprisingly, happier that those who put their faith in themselves, in hedonism or in material objects. It may be that there are more atheists in our society than fifty years ago, but Government research shows that despite the increased wealth of most people and, we suppose, the loss of faith in some people, there has been no increase in feelings of well-being in the same period.
  
  In the end, hopelessness is the cross that atheists have to bear.
  
  We look forward to the disappearance of these posters.
  
  Yours faithfully
  
  Josephine Robinson

Catholic Times

Dear Editor

We, in the Association of Catholic Women, wholeheartedly welcome the survey conducted by More showing that 47% of women believe that the upper limit for abortions is too high at 24 weeks' gestation (Catholic Times 5 Feb.) We wish that more women thought so. However, the fear of all who uphold the inviolability of life from conception is that a reduction of some weeks on permitted late abortions will be balanced by the even greater availability of early abortions. We know that there are some politicians who have argued in favour of first trimester abortions on demand in law (though they are easily obtained in current practice). Some babies might be saved, but many more might perish.

Humanity is not a thing that creeps up on babies when they start to move and suck their thumbs in the womb. They are human from conception because their parents are human, co-creators with God himself—and being human means having an immortal destiny.

Yours sincerely

Josephine Robinson