Speaking at the Plenary session of the Pontifical Council for Social Communications, of which he is a member, in Rome last week, Cardinal Keith O'Brien claimed that in all its communications work, the Catholic Church "must offer a radically different vision to that which is offered by the contemporary post-Christian culture".

Cardinal O'Brien went on to say that building up good media relations, can "help lower any barriers that the Church may face from a media which can reflect a society with little or no understanding of Catholicism."

After describing a range of technological initiatives being undertaken by the Scottish Catholic Media Office, the Cardinal concluded with a call for the Scottish media to display "not favour but simply fairness" in all its reporting.

The full text of the Cardinal's intervention is shown below.

The meeting of the Pontifical Council for Social Communications, included an audience for the participants with Pope Benedict XVI who commenting on the influence of the media said;

"I appeal again to the leaders of the media industry to advise producers to safeguard the common good, to uphold the truth, to protect individual human dignity and promote respect for the needs of the family,'

ENDS

Notes to Editors:



Peter Kearney
Director
Catholic Media Office
5 St. Vincent Place
Glasgow
G1 2DH
0141 221 1168
pk@scmo.org
www.scmo.org


PONTIFICAL COUNCIL FOR SOCIAL COMMUNICATIONS