Seminar focuses on media-church relationship

A SPEAKER at the Church and Media conference in Dublin yesterday said there was "a real need to recognise the reality of prejudice" between the two institutions.

Sister Helena O'Donoghue, of the Mercy Order, told the conference at All Hallows College that the Roman Catholic Church was "prejudiced in so far as she is suspicious of media", whereas the media "seem suspicious of the church as never telling the truth".

Her experience was that there could not be dialogue in that atmosphere "and the wedge of prejudice on both sides only gets wider".

What is needed by both institutions, she suggested, was "a willingness to be called to order by each other in a way that is human, dignified, truthful and passionate".

In her address to the conference, Ms Liz Harries, press officer with the Church of Ireland, had always believed "that the public expect the churches of all institutions to be open and honest".

Trust, she said, was necessary on both sides.

Referring to this weekend in Drumcree, she would prevent photographers from being present during the church service next Sunday should the Orange parade go ahead.

"I have a duty to protect the Church of Ireland from scenes inside the church that would send the wrong signals to the public," she said.

Father Dermod McCarthy, head of religious programmes at RTE, said that by and large the churches and the media institutions "inhabit different spaces, are mutually suspicious of each other and have contrasting perceptions of the world around them".

They, speak "different languages. It was very important that each try to understand not only the language "but the imperatives that drive each other".