Pope Benedict's history of censorship

11 Feb 13 | Uncategorized


Many, many things will be written about the papacy of Benedict XVI in the coming days (as a good summary of Ratzinger’s reign, I’d highly recommend this from John Hooper).

For me, it’s worth noting, briefly, Joseph Ratzinger’s historic association with Vatican censorship.

Previous to becoming Pope in 2005, Ratzinger had been head of the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith — previously known as the Holy Office, and before that the Sacred Congregation of the Inquisition (bear with me).

The Holy Office had, in 1917, absorbed the Sacred Congregation of the Index. This was the body responsible for the maintenance of the Index Librorum Prohibitorum — the list of books and authors the Vatican prohibited Catholics from reading. This list, started after approval at the Council of Trent in the 16th century, contained authors from Giordano Bruno to Jean Paul Satre.

The Index was last updated in 1948. It’s very existence became an issue for debate during the discussions of the Second Vatican Council.

One of the main proponents of retaining the Index of banned books was Cardinal Frings, formerly the Archbishop of Cologne. Frings’s “Peritus” (theological consultant) during Vatican Two was Joseph Ratzinger. Frings and Ratzinger failed, and the Index Librorum Prohibitorum was abolished in 1966.

A few years later, when trying to think of a name for a new magazine documenting censorship around the world, poet Stephen Spender, journalist Michael Scammell and others settled, with an ironic nod to Rome, on “Index“.

And here we are today.

The BBC was biased to the point of censorship in its coverage of the Papal visit

23 Sep 10 | Uncategorized

The BBC has flagrantly breached its duty, under the Communications Act 2003 (s.319) to present news with “due impartiality”. For four days, sixteen hours a day, its news reporting of the papal visit has been grovelling and entirely uncritical. 

The Pope is a political figure (hence his “state” visit) and no significant critic or opponent was invited to balance the parade of biased interviewees, inevitably biased because they were almost all Catholics. Even on Saturday, when up to 15,000 citizens marched to Downing Street, the protest was largely ignored by the BBC. Their speakers included Richard Dawkins, whose important speech refuting the Pope’s claims about atheism causing the Holocaust was entirely ignored. This was biased and unbalanced censorship of news, for which Ofcom must hold the BBC’s Catholic editor-in-chief Mark Thompson responsible. The BBC became a vehicle for endless and mindless Catholic propaganda.

One of Britain’s leading media law experts, Geoffrey Robertson QC, author of Robertson & Nicol on Media Law (fifth edition) and also author of The Case of the Pope said, “This breach of the due impartiality requirement was blatant and deliberate, and a disgrace to British broadcasting.”