Catholic literacy

Walk into any South African shopping mall of a certain size, and you are likely to find a classy media centre aimed at Christians of an evangelical bent. These shops stock a wide variety of books and CDs, and attract good numbers of patrons, many of them young people.

Their evidently thriving existence is attributable to a culture of media consciousness in the church communities they serve. Like St Paul and the evangelists before them, the evangelical churches have recognised that the most effective means of evangelisation is through the media.

Contrast this with the situation of social communications in the Catholic Church in South Africa. Our communities can sustain at most two Catholic bookshops in urban centres, fewer in smaller cities, because of limited demand for Catholic reading. A Catholic bookshop in a flashy mall is an unthinkable proposition, as is the idea that secular bookshops might carry a range of Catholic books.

Simply put, the local Church lacks a culture of Catholic reading, a reality that expresses itself also in the difficulties that this newspaper and other Catholic periodicals experience in increasing circulation.

Research is required to establish the precise reasons for this. Some, however, are immediately apparent.

For one, most Catholics lack a commitment to their faith. For them, the Christian obligation is fulfilled at Sunday Mass, a bargain that lasts till next Sunday. Consuming Christian literature is secondary to the lifestyle magazine or the Sunday newspaper (never mind the electronic alternatives of TV, PC, DVD or PS2).

This tendency points to a failure in the formation of the Catholic community; a failure our evangelical peers have escaped. Indeed, the success of their media apostolate is likely to feed itself.

It is ironic that this neglect should have gathered pace at the same time as the Church has had at its head the most media savvy of pontiffs. Pope John Paul II has communicated his message through all available media, except perhaps film. All the way, the local Church has virtually disengaged itself from the social communications apostolate, with some exceptions.

This has been most evident in the Southern African Catholic Bishops’ Conference, where what once was a Social Communications Commission, the highest rank of department within the conference, was gradually downgraded to the status of desk, the lowest level. Even today, it is staffed only by two part-time (albeit highly competent) workers, both priests with parishes to run. This cannot be satisfactory.

A great burden of the failure in Catholic literacy rests also on those parishes that have suspended the social communications apostolate; a greater burden yet on those where that apostolate has been undermined.

So, what is to be done?

The will to tackle this crucial matter must be found, on all levels. The bishops have made an encouraging start by fixing the date for the annual Social Communications Sunday, which will now be observed on the first Sunday in September with a second collection (but will the parishes follow?).

More needs to be done. The bishops may see value in launching a Catholic Literacy Campaign. Such a campaign could serve to promote the idea of reading Catholic books and publications on parish level, involving both clergy and laity.

Catholic literacy is elementary in the on-going formation of the faithful. The prevailing apathy, never mind opposition, to Catholic media can do only harm to the Church.