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Catholics Unplug your Televisions
Christians Unplug your Televisions
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Issue
11 Winter/Lent 2005/06
Issue 12 Spring/Summer
2006
Issue
13 Summer/Winter
2007
The television - a spiritual health warning
The dictatorship of relativism and Ten anti-Commandments
of the TV
1) The TV puts false gods before the Lord God
The gods of all faiths are equal, that materialism, self-centredness, and all
morals are relative, are put before the Gospel of Jesus.
2) The TV and Blasphemy
Not only taking of the Lord’s name in vain but at the BBC’s “Impartiality
seminar,” staff confirmed they would allow the Bible to be sacrilegiously
treated, but not the Koran.
3) The TV and the desecration of the Lord’s Day
Sunday’s TV is like any other day containing programmes of sex and violence.
No longer a day of rest and worship of God. Sunday TV is for the worship of
sport and materialism.
4) The TV and the destruction of the family.
How can children honour their mother and their father when the TV constantly
denigrates family values, and shows fornication, and same-sex marriage in a
positive light?
5) The TV and the trivialisation of killing
Empirical studies have shown, TV violence leads to violence and killings. Stabbings
and shootings are now all too common on our streets with the constant lowering
of TV standards.
6) The TV, the promoter of adultery
Our Lady of Fatima said to the visionaries that more souls go to hell because
of sins against purity than any other sin. On the TV the promotion of impurity
and adultery are writ large.
7) The TV and the theft of souls
Satin is the thief of souls. St. Elizabeth Seton (c1800s) had a vision she did
not understand. She saw a black box in every American home, through which the
devil would enter.
8) The TV, the false witness
Every year more programmes are made that bare false witness against the Church.
9) The TV, the author of sexual covetousness
Jesus said: “If your right eye causes you to sin pluck it out and throw
it away; it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole
body be thrown into hell” (Matt 5:29).
10) The TV as the author material covetousness
Advertising promotes materialism and things you don’t need or really want.
Pester power turns children into the allies of the advertising executives and
the enemy of poor parents.
Towards a Dictatorship of Relativism
By Stefano Mazzeo
During his homily for the Mass of the Conclave the then Cardinal Ratzinger said,
“We are moving toward a dictatorship of relativism which does not recognize
anything as for certain and which has as its highest goal one’s own ego
and one’s own desires.”1 I have been intrigued by these words ever
since and in this article here I wish to explore relativism and its dictator.
I sometimes get invited to give talks to church groups or a priest might ask
me to say a few words after Mass. On one occasion I was going through my three
minute slot after Mass when I heard grumbling coming from the back of the church.
Afterwards, a man came up to me and said I was being dictatorial. So I answered
him that surely he can’t begrudge me three minutes to point out the dangers
of the TV when he will spend at least four hours in front of the box today.
If he believes in free speech he will listen to the other side of the argument
but no, this citizen of the ‘Republic of Relativism’ continued to
disrupt my giving out of newsletters and leaflets. I concluded later that this
was a victim of the Dictatorship of Relativism. He would not listen because
he believed in free speech!
What does the Holy Father mean when he warns us about Relativism or more precisely
the Dictatorship of Relativism. Relativism is the belief that everything is
equal; all faiths are the same and so are morals, especially sexual morals and
are relative to the desires of the self. There is no truth, one man’s
truth is as good and the next, e.g. homosexuality is the equal of heterosexuality
and they have the right to have children even though they can’t. So the
government enacts legislation that crushes natural law, legalises ‘Civil
Partnerships’ and gives homosexuals the right to adopt children. No agency
may refuse them on the grounds of religious beliefs. Even in this the government
are not the real dictators of relativism, they are merely the lackeys of the
Dictator. This Dictator tells us that all morals are relative except murder,
unless of course they are weak and old, or very ill then they should be treated
with dignity – and killed! The dictators of relativism will go into long
discourses and seek out all views, for all views are equal. After all what is
truth as Pilot said to Jesus. Theft is still wrong unless it is your faith or
your soul. Blasphemy, materialism fornication, adultery, violence, and family
values are all relative. It is only children that really suffer and children
should be seen and not heard. Unless of course they are unborn, therefore they
are neither seen or heard for out of sight is out of mind. The dictator of relativism
is pro-choice, for choice is a good thing. Unless of course you are a child
in your mother’s womb then you have no voice or choice.
We are told all religions are ultimately the same and even Paganism is equal
to Christianity in terms of being efficacious of spiritual awareness. That we
are all on different roads but travelling to the same place. This may sound
good and charitable, even to some Catholics but it is wrong and not what our
faith teaches us. I am not saying that there are not some truly wonderfully
good people in other faiths. We believe know that a good person who is invincibility
ignorant of Jesus may be saved. However, it is true charity and the duty of
all Christians is to share the Good News of Jesus with all mankind. For ‘Christ
is the only Son of God…and that the man Jesus is eternally God, is God
Himself’2 However the dictator of relativism would rather we believed
that - ‘Instead of being the man who is God, Christ becomes the one who
experienced God in a special way.’3
Jesus is no different to any other religious leader, therefore all religions
are the same and as they all say different things perhaps ultimately none can
be true. So God is either very vague or dose not exist– just what Satan
wants us to think.
The Hypnotic effect of the television
The real dictator of relativism is of course the Devil, the great deceiver,
and the giver of the knowledge of good and evil, but not the wisdom to know
the difference. There are many weapons, which the dictator of relativism will
use to attack us. The vast array of media genre with secular intellectuals who
tell us to have an open mind and governments that legislate and enact laws to
follow their lead. But of all the weapons in the Dictator of Relativism’s
arsenal the television is most effective. The television is not only mildly
hypnotic, it also desensitises the reasoning logical side of the brain and plays
on the emotional side. The accumulative effect of this is devastating and it
is difficult to see what’s happening but its ill effects are all around
us. The TV is in virtually every person’s home and watched by almost everyone.
Many dramas and documentaries that play on our emotions have a relativistic
agenda and will try and discredit the Churches teachings on faith and morals.
Against these attacks the Church is given very little chance to answer and when
she does all the tricks of the book is deployed against her. It is this hypnotic
quality that is the Dictator of Relativism’s most dangerous weapon. Against
its onslaught there is not much most people can do for they are unaware there
is a problem. The television acts on humanity like an anti-spiritual neutron
bomb; it leaves the body intact (superficially) but destroys the soul.
The television can be very subtle, it is sometimes difficult to distinguish
good and bad television programmes for they are all treated equally, given the
same amount of time and demand the same attention. Most of the classics may
be harmless e.g. Austin and Dickens, however there are programmes of a similar
genre that not so harmless.
The disastrous effect the TV has had on the last few countries to receive it
are well known by scientists who study the TV4. For the introduction of television
has always coincided with a dramatic increase in violence, theft, murder, and
rape. The corrosive effect on people by television is well documented but not
well publicised, for the broadcasters control what we see what we hear and even
what we think.
There are thousands of TV channels broadcasting seven days a week, twenty-four
hours a day. Cultural and moral vandalism is endemic. The Virginia University
killer sent a tape of himself to NBC TV between his massacres, which to much
dismay was broadcast.
Only people with a strong faith can see the wrong in it all for they have a
measure from which to see. They know that to be intrigued by the backbiting,
gossipy, angry storylines of soaps is incompatible with the Gospel. They know
the truth when the Church is attacked, and they can see the agenda. They can
see through the biased, relativistic documentaries. They question everything
using their faith and the Gospel of Jesus as a guide. These people will eventually
throw out the TV, if they haven’t already done so.
References:
1.(Benedict XVI), homely 18th April 2005
2 & 3. Introduction to Christianity (Benedict XVI) p.21 2004
4. Dr Aric Sigman, Remotely Controlled, Vermilion, 2005
RTE’s Middle Class, Elitist Ghetto of Dublin 4
By Dominic Casey in Dublin
You could write a book or even volumes on the effect the television has had on the Irish People. The main Irish broadcasting network RTE is situated in Donnybrook, Dublin 4. It is a well to do area. There is now a term ‘The Dublin 4 set’ and ‘the Dublin 4 mentality’. Dublin 4 meaning RTE. The ‘Dublin 4 set’ would consist of high earners and the upper middle class. They would be out of university. They would be of a liberal mindset and all that would suggest. Anti-Catholic or at least indifferent to church issues, especially on morality. This would be the type that would hold sway in RTE. So this is the message that would be continuously transmitted from there. No doubt there are good church abiding people working at RTE but they would be the minority and in less influential positions. Dònnacha O’Dualing of Fàifteisteach fame would probably be of this latter type.
However, we may be witnessing the destruction of Irish Culture itself. Ireland was once known as the most Catholic country in Europe and Celtic Catholicism had its own particular ethnicity that permeated every strand of Irish society. The media has been to the fore in Church bashing regarding the scandals. That the abuses have been highlighted and brought out into the open is not such a bad thing. But the media and RTE in particular threw out the baby with the bath water. When the scandals broke there was a decrease in church attendance. And everything about the Church was painted black. In doing this they are destroying the soul of Irish culture. Dublin is now indistinguishable from any big ‘British city’ with loud ruckus behaviour and bad manners. Where once they was a gentle sparkle in the eyes of young Irish children raised on the Sacraments and the Rosary there is now only the dull blankness archived by hours of daily TV and computer viewing.
People tune into the popular chat shows for their daily diet
of gossip and opinion. Foremost among them would be ‘The Late Late Show’
on Friday night with Pat Kenny and his daily radio show on RTE 1. There is the
Gerry Ryan show on Radio RTE 2. Ryan is unashamedly liberal who enjoys constantly
having a swipe at the Church. The nature and content of his show is very dissolute
and he enjoys a wide listenership. This obviously all impacts on society.
In the case of the television (as has been pointed out in CUT’s Autumn
06 issue), it desensitises the beta waves of the left hemisphere of the brain,
which would deal with information logically. This inevitably makes the person
a prey to the standards that are presented to him.
RTE has constantly come under criticism for its biased and unfair handling of moral issues in its current affairs programmes. I would say Ireland would be not much different than Britain in how it has been affected by television. In the past twenty years church attendances has dropped by a good bit. Divorce has been introduced. Marriage break-ups are up. Co-habitation is the norm, teenage pregnancies are up, Condom sales have been introduced and there has been the inevitable increase in S.T.D.S. Has the television influenced Irish society?u decide.
Irish TV Protest
Recently a dissatisfied customer decided to register his complaint to R.T.E. He drove his car through the front barriers. Drove through the front door of the building, while the Late Late Show was going on. - That’s complaining Irish style!
Homosexuality and the Television
By Stefano Mazzeo
It is an act of Christian charity to point out when someone is going astray.
This is not being judgemental, for not to do so would be negligent. On the basis
of Sacred Scripture and the Catechism of the Catholic Church, homosexual acts
are a grave sin. We must therefore point out the link between the acceptance
of homosexuality by society, and the television. For within ten years of the
television coming into widespread use in Britain, homosexuality was legalised.
Since then there has been the constant lowering of the age of homosexual consent
until parity with heterosexual consent was achieved. Now legalised homosexual
partnerships have the right to adopt children. Just when ordinary Christians
thought things couldn’t get any worse, the government brings fourth draconian
legislation that will force Catholic adoption agencies to close down or let
homosexuals adopt from them.
It is not surprising that this has happened with the sheer number of pro-homosexual
television programmes broadcast down the years. Today we have openly homosexual
television presenters, commentators, and actors. Makeover programmes show homosexual
couples choosing the décor for their pads. There are also the constant
pro-homosexual story lines in the soaps and other dramas. This trait has even
spilled over onto BBC Radio with the ‘Gay-marriage’ in the Archers.
Also prevalent in these programmes are storylines that demonise anyone who are
portrayed as ‘anti-gay,’ these people are usually shown as nasty,
brutish and violent. Words like ‘bigoted’, ‘gay-bashing’,
or ‘homophobic’ are used to put down anyone who dares speak up against
homosexual acts.
It is also very clear that the BBC is especially ‘pro-Gay’ with
a disproportionate number of homosexuals on its staff. They are particularly
over represented among those in influential positions. There are many who believe
that this is the main reason why the BBC attacks Catholicism so often. Why you
may ask have so many homosexuals risen so high in the world of television? There
are many reasons; in order to keep people’s attention, new and inventive
storylines for showing relationships are constantly found. The homosexual lifestyle
is not a stay-at-home family orientated one; therefore the hedonistic showbiz
one suits them. Perhaps also in this contraceptive ‘Culture of Death’
society, there is the false perception that humans have over populated the world.
There is also the false theory that humans have no control over their sexual
desires, so homosexuality is a useful form of sterility. It is true that the
television is no friend of chastity and has sexualised society beyond what is
natural. Some like to cite the television series Sex in the City as authentically
portraying modern female sexuality, yet they are wrong, for although originally
created by a woman, homosexual men produced this series. The creator and producer
of Desperate Housewives is also homosexual. An unnaturally over sexualised society
plays into the hands of homosexual lobby whose raison d’être is
unnatural sex. Yet despite all their efforts, homosexuality has not been found
to be a cognitive, it is achieved through conditioning.
There is also the homosexual phenomenon of “Boy Love” as they like
to call it (give me strength, Lord). There are a disproportionately high number
of paedophiles amongst the male ‘Gay’ population. Researcher Dr
Judith Reisman has stated that fewer than 2% of the male population are homosexual,
yet they account for roughly half of all paedophiles cases. (See www.drjudithreismen.org
for a fuller explanation). Yet the BBC will scour the earth for paedophile priests
but will not do a documentary on “Boy Love” or the high proportion
of ‘Gay’ paedophiles. Is this a case of the pro-homosexual media
taking the speck out of other people’s eyes, yet forgetting the plank
in their own?
News Cuttings
BBC anger at £2bn licence fee shortfall
Daily Telegraph 19/1/07.
The BBC warned last night that it faced a £2 billion funding shortfall
after the Government rejected calls for an above-inflation rise in the licence
fee. CUT comment – lucky for the BBC that they’re not a private
company.
‘Rome’ back with even more blood Sunday
Telegraph 7/1/07.
A corpse being given breast milk from a nursing mother, a blood-soaked soldier
carrying a head through the streets and a slave being tortured to death –
these are the scenes that await viewers of the new series Rome, the BBC’s
controversial hit drama. CUT – Should this kind of violent trash be ‘free’
to air?
Grubby EastEnders Daily Mail 4/1/07.
How sad and grubby were the episodes of EastEnders shown on TV over Christmas.
I watched them because I wanted to see the final episodes starring Pauline (Wendy
Richard). But the storyline about a young girl seducing an older man was horrible.
CUT – Christmas at the BBC in the 21st century, sad and grubby.
Beeb takes artistic licence to get on down dirty Sunday
Times 5/1/07.
The new licence fee is announced this week, so the BBC can finally breathe a
sigh of relief and unleash its worst upon us. And the first big news is that
BBC3 has commissioned a documentary about what modesty commands me to refer
as the ladies’ front bottom. Called The History of the C-word, it will
be at least an hour long and will take its place in the television canon alongside
Channel 4’s W**k Week (probably sniggering as it does so). It’s
barely a year since Germaine Greer gave viewers of BBC2’s Balderdash and
Piffle an illuminating lecture on the origins of the word. Have these people
no mercy? CUT - nope
Is it time to scrap the TV licence? The Economist
6/1/07
Debate has raged for years over whether the BBC should still be publicly financed,
and specifically by a licence fee that is by all those with television sets.
Many households, after all, now watch and listen to little of its output but
almost all pay £131.50 a year for it. CUT - IT IS time to scrap the TV
licence.
Yes, we are biased on religion and politics admit BBC executives Daily Mail 23/10/06 CUT – A leak from the BBC’s own Politburo
Last week’s vote results: Sunday Express
10/12/06
We asked for your views on falling standards of today’s television programmes:
Is today’s TV just a load of rubbish?
YES: 99% NO: 1%
CUT – So 99% of TV viewers admit they spent their time watching rubbish.
Dose this sounds like drug addiction or hypnotism?
C4 ‘delight’ over Big Brother Daily
Mail 23/1/07
Channel 4 chiefs congratulated themselves yesterday on the bumper rating of
Celebrity Big Brother. They met to discuss the controversy over the allegedly
racist bullying of Bollywood star Shilpa Shetty by other contestants including
Jade Goody. CUT - After racist bullying and media hype C4 ratings sore. Sounds
like mob rule via the TV.
Does Davina go too far in sex education show?
Daily Mail 8/3/07
In [Channel 4’s] Let’s Talk sex, Miss McCall accompanies four teenagers
and two school heads to a Dutch youth centre. The group sits in on sex education
lessons in which children as young as four are taught about homosexuality and
shown cartoons of various sex acts. At one point in the show, Miss McCall, a
mother of three, unrolls a condom over a prosthetic sex aid in front of two
schoolchildren. CUT – If that exasperates you, read this:
Don’t switch off Channel Phwoar- Its no good harruphing
about too much sex on the box – the world has moved on. By Magnus
Linklater The Times 15/11/06
I completely agree with Sir Jeremy Issacs that Channel 4 is obsessed with sex.
I am less certain that this is a bad thing. Most of us, I fear – even
Sir Jeremy perhaps – take a keen interest in the subject; at what point
this shades into an unhealthy interest is hard to define.
CUT – with words like Phwoar and harruphing looks like The Times has moved
on as well. However perhaps Mr Linklater should read the following.
Children film sex on their mobiles Sunday Times
4/2/07
Children are using mobiles phones to film each other having sex and are then
sending the images to classmates. CUT – Where will these children use
the skills they’ve acquired, Channel 4?
Young pupils abuse teachers with sexual swear words
The Times 24/11/06
Children as young as 5 are consistently swearing at teachers with nearly 20
per cent of primary school teachers claiming to have been subject to sexually
abusive insults from pupils. In a study commissioned by National Union of Teachers,
England’s largest teaching union, researchers also found that 75 per cent
of secondary school teachers said that pupils used language such as “F***
you” or “I’ve F***** your mum” to one another. CUT –
We get tied of people saying, ‘I blame the parents’ when its really
the TV’s fault – but then the parents do let children watch the
TV.
Thursday’s TV Choice The Times 03-07
The blackest of comedies involving incest, deviant priests and necrophilia in
a nursing home! CUT – This is bad even by channel 4’s standards,
this new ‘comedy’ has been reported to evolve child abuse, suicide,
drug addiction, priest spanking and even a dog that rapes a man. This might
be the Times’ TV Choice but we say its more discussing filth by a channel
that seems to be possessed by evil.
Schoolchildren of 11 get sex counsellors Daily
Mail 25/10/06
CUT – No Comment
The Holy Father’s Message for the World Day of Social Communications
“The complex challenges facing education today are often linked to the
pervasive influence of the media in our world… Indeed, some claim that
the formative influence of the media rivals that of the school, the Church,
and maybe even the home. Reality, for many, is what the media recognize as real.
So often freedom is presented as a relentless search for pleasure or new experience.
Any trend to produce programs and products – including animated films
and video games – which in the name of entertainment exalt violence and
portray anti-social behaviour or the trivialization of human sexuality is a
perversion, all the more repulsive when these programs are directed at children
and adolescents.
BBC executives admit they are anti-Christian
From Edward Botterell
Late last autumn BBC executives admitted what critics have known for years,
that the corporation is institutionally biased. The revelation came from leaked
details of an ‘impartiality’ summit called by its then chairman,
Michael Grade. Senior figures admitted that the BBC is guilty of promoting Left-wing
views and anti-Christian sentiment. It was also suggested that the BBC is guilty
of political correctness and was disproportionately over-represented by homosexuals.
One senior BBC executive admitted that the summit had opened peoples’
eyes to how biased the BBC had become. ‘Unfortunately, much of it is so
deeply embedded in the BBC’s culture, that it’s very hard to change
it.’ Jesus said: He who is not with me is against me, and he who does
not gather with me scatters.’ St Luke (11:23).
CUT’s RECOMMENDED READ
THIS TIME IT’S A MAGAZINE
Inside the Vatican,
This magazine keeps you abreast of what’s happening in Rome, see what
the Holy Fathers saying and doing – he’s a very busy man.
For details write to:
Inside The Vatican,
P.O. Box No 42, Horsforth, Leeds, LS18 4UH, England
Or USA
Inside the Vatican, New Hope, KY 40052 USA
Editorial Office
Inside the Vatican, Via Delle Mura Aurelie 7c, Rome 00165, Italy
We support EWTN
At CUT we believe the television is fundamentally flawed and we will try and
persuade people to give it up. However, we also support EWTN for we are realistic
enough to realise we cannot get rid of the television completely. The gospel
of Jesus should be proclaimed and his Church should be represented, wherever
there are souls to be saved.
Notice board:
Many thanks to all who contributed to this newsletter, whether by articles, information, suggestions, research, letters of support and prayers. Thanks also for the generous response to our call for funds, to cover our print run and postage costs have doubled in the last year.
Request for information:
We have been recommended two books by our members that may be out of print:
The Mask of Hate by David Holbrok, and Set Free Childhood by Martin Lurge –
Can anyone help?
CUT suggests we give the licence fee to charity where it can do
some good. Here are some suggestions:
Peters Pence – His Holiness Pope Benedict XVI
0120 Vatican City State, Europe.
Or SPUC 5/6 Matthew Street, FREEPOST SW620, Westminster, London,
SW1 2BR.
Or Aid to the Church in Need 1 Times Square, Sutton, Surrey
SM1 1LL.
Or EWTN Britain: St Clare Media (EWTN) Ltd. (Charity No 1080782)
PO Box 913, Enfield EN2 0WY
Or EWTN Ireland: St Brigid Media Ltd. (Charity No 15025) PO
Box 352, Limerick, 061 394400
Contact us at:
C U T
(Catholics Unplug your Televisions)
Waun Llydan, St David’s Well
Llananno,
Powys, LD1 6YP
Help us be effective in the fight against the secular fundamentalist’s
most deadly weapon the television, please send donations to the above address
with cheques made out to CUT or Catholics Unplug your Televisions.
Most important of all please remember us in your prayers.
ISSUE 13, 2006
Should television
carry a health warning?
We believe the TV is nasty and bad and even damages people’s
health.
Ten reasons why, like cigarettes, the TV should display government health
warnings on screen and be read aloud before each programme:
1) The TV damages children’s health
Young children should not be exposed to TV at all for it affects child
brain development. Medical research has exposed the link between ADHD
(Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder) and TV.
2) The TV is a major cause of adult health problems
Scientific research has discovered that prolonged TV watching leads to
serious health problems.
3) The TV and violence in society
After the arrival of TV in any society there is always a surge in violence,
even killing and rape.
4) The TV and abortion
The BBC’s sexwise website gives abortion advise, together with its
partner the IPPF.
5) The TV sexualises society
Young girls are reaching puberty at least 4 years earlier than before
the arrival of the TV.
6) The TV pollutes people’s minds
What happens on the TV soon happens in society, dramas that show happily
married couples with loving families do not make good TV. The soaps and
most dramas depict fornication, adultery, anger, backbiting, scheming,
lying, sex and violence, which have all become common in society.
7) The TV and brainwashing
There is a law banning Hypnotism on TV. For it was proved in the fifties
that the medium of television lends itself too easily to hypnotism. Therefore,
it is not surprising the effect TV has had on society is akin to brainwashing.
No wonder Mao Tse Tung wanted one in every Chinaman’s home.
8) The TV and Catholicphobia
It is in the self-interest of the politically correct, ‘pro-choice’
elite of TV land to develop Catholicphobia, for the teachings of the Church
are the opposite to what makes ‘good’ TV. We believe if the
TV followed the teachings of Jesus there would be no AIDS and a gentler
society.
9) The TV wastes huge amounts of time
The average of four hours TV viewing per night is equal to over 12 years
of a person’s life.
10) The TV and Blasphemy - the most damaging of all
One of the most common places to find blasphemy is on TV, from taking
of the Lord’s Name in vain to programmes on Jesus and his Church,
which destroys people’s spiritual health.
Why we ask Catholics to give up the TV
We ask Catholics to give up the TV for the sake of the Church and for
society in general. Even if you feel personally that what you see does
not affect your faith or you just want to see the news. You may feel that
you can control what come into your house by the On/Off switch. However,
most people cannot control the On/Off switch and are in fact controlled
by the TV in what they think and what they do. So we ask you for the sake
of others to make this ‘sacrifice’ and register your peaceful
protest. It is only when broadcasters are deprived of funds and influence
will they become more reasonable.
Catholic teaching on faith and morals is almost the exact opposite to much that is broadcast on the TV. This is of course why we are under such attack. For the vast majority of the media moguls and their producers, presenters, and artists depict scenes and promote lifestyles that are incompatible with the Gospel.
The world they create for the small screen is one of sensation and moral relativism where violence, adultery, fornication, bad manners, homosexuality and greed are the norm. The TV influences all the other media as it is the most powerful and the BBC influences all other TV channels for the same reason. By giving up the TV you do not have to pay a license fee. So why fund the BBC and its attacks on the Church.
Some say that there are two sorts of people in the modern world, those who do things with their life, and those who sit at home at watch other people doing things on the television. By giving up the TV you free up such a lot of time. You could join a life group, a prayer group become more active in your church. You could attend cultural events or learn to play a musical instrument. Visit the sick or imprisoned lead a fuller and more useful life.
The
TV is the greatest health scandal
of our age
Over the last few years there have been a number of studies published by the scientific and medical world regarding television viewing and its damaging affects on health. There have also been quite a few new books written by doctors and educationalists concerned with the ill affects of the TV on the health of children.
From the very start of CUT’s campaign to persuade
Catholics and all people of faith and good will to give up the TV. People
have contacted us saying that the TV is a major cause of ill health; depression
and insomnia are often mentioned. However, this is just the tip of the
iceberg. The TV is the greatest health scandal of our age, 1.
The Television damages the health of children
The area of most concern is the serious damage television viewing will do to young children’s learning abilities. In order for a child’s brain to develop the child needs active play with real objects such as toys etc. When a child watches the television its brain is in neutral and is not being stimulated, therefore it is not developing. The television does not make a child’s mind work, it cannot engage with them in an active and useful way. Contrary to what most people think the television will not teach a child to talk, eye contact with parents is needed so that they can interact with them. Teachers everywhere are reporting that children are starting school with poorer language skills than ever before, 2. In a recent American study of 1,797 children who watched three hours of television per day before the age of 3, it was discovered that they have poorer reading and maths skills at the ages of 6 and 7 than those who’s television viewing was limited, 3.
Doctors and scientists are now attributing ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder) in children to television watching and now say that children should not be exposed any television at all, 4. The number of children with ADHD has reached epidemic levels. Their attention span is very limited together with being disruptive and lacking concentration. Time spent in front of the TV is time that cannot be reclaimed; ever hour a young child spends in front of the TV has a negative impact on its abilities. If it is a scandal for television companies to target young children by their programming, the BBC’s Teletubbies is tantamount to child abuse. Children should never have a TV in their bedrooms; besides ADHD and having access to hugely inappropriate programmes, it will deprive them of sleep.
There are other health risks that stem from a childhood and adolescence immersed in television viewing such as obesity, poor fitness, smoking, and raised cholesterol. A longitudinal birth cohort study of 1000 individuals by University of Otago, New Zealand has made a strong association between child and adolescent television viewing and adult health, 5. They have discovered the more television children watch the greater the risk they will develop heart disease, cancer, type 2 diabetes (caused by obesity), or have a stroke in adulthood.
In a recent Lancet study of the physical activity of children between the ages of 3 and 5 it was found that they do not move at all for 80% of the day. Some are only active for 20 minutes a day. When these statistics were shown to another group of scientists they wrongly assumed they are from desk bound office workers. Dr Reilly the studies leader explains ‘They have the lifestyle of middle-aged adults; they are old before their time. They are more likely to suffer from heart disease, diabetes, osteoporosis and other health problems, 6.’ The authors of the Lancet study state that the television is the cause of this problem.
When parents do manage to drag their child away from the TV screen, some find the child has developed behavioral problems, i.e. hyperactive and disruptive, in the supermarket, on the street, and at school. A child severely affected with ADHD can make its parents life hell. The only solution then is Ritalin. However many children who are given Ritalin go on to become drug addicts. Kurt Cobain of rock group Nirvana was on Ritalin as a child. After Cobain’s suicide Courtney Love, another rock star said, ‘When you’re a kid and you get this drug that makes you feel that feeling, where else are you going to turn when you’re an adult? It was euphoric when you were a child – isn’t that memory going to stick with you, 7?’
The Television as a cause of adult health problems
If adults watch the average of four hours TV per day and have watched television since childhood they risk serious illnesses. Continued television viewing will shorten a person’s life. The TV not only demands motionless attention from its viewer but studies have shown it also makes them hungry. People not only eat more whilst watching TV, they eat faster. This leads to an unnatural level of body mass, which in conjunction with inactivity, causes the life threatening diseases already mentioned. Cases of myopia (short-sightedness) are at an all time high. People, who have played with computers and watched television as children, then get a job with computers and watch television in the evenings, risk getting extreme myopia, which can lead to blindness, 8. A person who has spent an average of four hours per day in front of the box will have accumulated over twelve years of continuous viewing. The TV has stolen a person’s life in more ways than one.
There is no indication that all this television viewing has made people happy. The sex and violence in films and dramas, the backbiting, bad manners and infidelity in soaps, the news with its pictures of violence and in some cases camera inspired violent protests, is a major cause of depression and insomnia. It is not only what the television shows us that leads to these mental health problems, it is also the way in which the television works on the mind.
The television changes our brain function by tuning out the left hemisphere, which analyses information logically and problem solves. This allows the right hemisphere to take over which processes information uncritically and emotionally, 9. It is no wonder that the World Health Organisation has reported a world epidemic of depression.
Should the television display a health warning?
We believe the television should carry a government health warning that should be continuously displayed on the screen. Perhaps also a viewing timer? But ultimately we have no hesitation in recommending people throw away the television. CUT urges people to write to their MPs and ask for a parliamentary debate on the health risks of television watching. Send to: The House of Commons, Westminster, London. SW1A 0AA.
References:
1. Remotely Controlled, Dr Aric Sigman, 2005, p ix
2,7. Toxic Childhood, Sue Palmer, 2006, p105 & 17
3, 4. Dr Frederick Zimmerman and Dr Dimitri Christakes of the University
of Washington’s Child Health Institute.
5. Dr Robert Hancox MD, Barry Milne MSc and Richie Poulton PhD, Duredin
School of Medicine, University of Otago, 2004 New Zealand.
6. J Reilly et al. Total Energy Expenditure and Physical Activity in Young
Scottish Children: Mixed Longitudinal Study, Lancet, 2004; 363 211-12.
8. Nowak, R. ‘Blame lifestyle for myopia, not genes’, New
Scientist, 10 July 2004, cited Dr Aric Sigman 2005.
9. Krugman, Herbert E. ‘Brain Wave Measures of Media Involvement’,
Journal of Advertising Research, 1971;11.1, 3-9 cited Dr Aric Sigman
More Catholic Bashing from the BBC
The misrepresentation of Pope Benedict’s speech
From time to time the BBC seems to engage in a bout Catholic bashing. It appears to have done this with increasing frequency in the last few years, only this time it stirred up Muslim anger against us. In doing so the BBC has been extremely irresponsible. Rather than trying to find out what was really meant by Pope Benedict’s speech at Regensburg by referring to the whole speech, they picked out one small passage and quoted it out of context. In doing this they stirred up trouble and went for sensation, rather than truth and honesty. The Pope, whose aim is to foster peaceful, honest dialogue between faiths also wrote a tremendous encyclical Deus Caritas Est. His work since coming to office has been to show God as a God of Love and Peace.
Muslim fury at the Pope’s speech started two day after the event when the BBC picked up on some minor protests in Pakistan, which their government was trying to suppress. They then started to broadcast multi-lingual reports to the world. The BBC have actually stoked the fires of religious hatred. These are just a few examples out of many: Friday 15th September on BBC Radio 5 live the presenter after listening to a Muslim leader’s unchallenged remarks then decided to remind listeners of the Crusades and the Spanish Inquisition! The BBC’s Word Service TV, broadcast to the world pictures of Pope Benedict’s effigies being burnt. BBC Online has also been irresponsible and economical with the truth in this matter and we believe it is not a balanced on-line news source.
These incidents show the secular fundamentalist BBC at its most subjective, prejudiced and dangerous for it plays into the hands of extremists. There have since been numerous attacks on Catholic churches throughout the world. The BBC should apologies for the damage they have done. They have put Catholics lives at risk.
If the BBC’s Catholic director-general Mark Thompson cannot inspire truthful reporting on Catholic affairs he should resign.
The attempted vilification of Pope Benedict XVI
The title of the recent Panorama programme “Sex Crimes and the Vatican” leave the viewer in do doubt of the message the BBC wants to get across. This programme attempted to accuse the Pope of masterminding a cover up of sex abuse by priests on children when the Pope is actually at the forefront of those trying to stamp out any such abuse. When he was a Cardinal he publicly called those ‘filth’ who engage in such actives.
The programme went into great detail (The Catholic Herald called this pornographic) regarding the horrors of child sex abuse. The programme then cited Vatican documents and accused Pope Benedict of a cover up. However, they have completely misunderstood the documents they quoted. In fact, (the Herald) are accusing the BBC of deliberately confusing the issue for the sake attacking the Church.
At CUT we believe that the vast majority of Catholic priests are good and holy men it is therefore very wrong for the BBC to keep singling out Catholic clergy in this regard when we know full well that other sections and institutions in society are more to blame in this regard. However, they will do anything it would seem to try and discredit our church simply because of the strong moral values we have.
Catholics might like to write to BBC Complaints at PO Box 1922 Glasgow, G2 3WT, and urge the BBC to be more truthful and responsible when reporting on Catholic affairs particularly on these matters.
Our Support for EWTN
This has been a contentious issue for many of our supporters who believe that TV is fundamentally flawed. That we should not support any television channels not even EWTN. So we have decided to adopt a policy to persuade people to give the TV up completely. It is also evident that most Catholics who do get rid of the TV are already strong in their faith.
However EWTN is an excellent Catholic station that evangelises through the most powerful media available, the TV and Radio. EWTN’s work is also in line with Vatican II teaching on Social Communication Inter Mirifica. Therefore, we suggest even if you have thrown the TV out you might like to support EWTN. No other English-speaking channel supports life issues and traditional family values to the extent of EWTN. Where else are there whole programmes against abortion? Not on the BBC that’s for sure.
EWTN is entirely dependent on the prayers and generosity of its viewers and benefactors. So please support them with prayers and donations even if you have thrown the TV away. Contact them at: St Clare Media (EWTN) Ltd. (Charity No 1080782), PO Box 913, Enfield EN2 0WY. Tel/Fax 08700 636734. www.ewtn.com
BBC Radio et al.
Is the BBC too powerful to achieve a balance in British broadcasting?
The TV licence fee also funds BBC Radio. There are simply
too many BBC Radio stations whose opinions dominate every field of British
life. BBC is everywhere with its brand of moral relativism, from sport
to pop from news and current affairs to drama. Here examples of the moral
anarchy that prevails on the Radio today:
Have BBC Radio suppressed the words husband and wife and use ‘partner’
nowadays? Take for example a woman who called BBC Radio Two, one afternoon
in July to take part in one of those mind-numbing quizzes. The DJ asked
her “are you married?” To which the caller responded “Yes”.
The DJ then asked “are you married to a man or a woman?”
Sept 14th Radio 5 live 9.50 - a caller rang in and complained about Radio
1 DJ’s saying that they get drunk and have a good time, for this
encourage youngsters to drink.
The Archers, not the most controversial of programmes you may think but here again there is evidence of politically correct social engineering. Take the case when a woman vicar came to Ambridge. All the grumpy types in the town were apposed to her, whereas all the nice types were in favour of her. However because the woman vicar was so nice even the grump types came around.
BBC World service TV and Radio, CUT supporters have said they are not friends of Catholics. Many attach much of the recent world Muslim fury at the Pope by the way in which the BBC reported it.
BBC Worldwide (heaven forbid this is a good time to recite the prayer to St Michael the Archangel) is the commercial wing of the corporation, which sells BBC programmes to the world. It has been very successful in selling Popetown to other countries and television companies such as MTV. Many German Catholics and their bishops are protesting against this nasty cartoon.
The following article appeared in Our Faith on Sunday newsletter
by the Catholic Printing Company of Farnworth, and is reprinted here by
kind permission
Christian Propaganda?
The BBC opened a piece on the new film of CS Lewis’s children’s story Narnia with this rhetorical question: “Is this Christian propaganda?” Channel 5 introduced a similar piece with the words “This film has been accused of being Christian.” Is it too religious for our children?” Then there were a number of TV accounts of the film, which emphasised that children did not understand that the film is a Christian allegory; with the implication that it was probably “safe” for children to see it. Sadly, our media not only take it for granted that Christianity is a legitimate target for derision and subversion. While once upon a time TV programming over Christmas could have been relied on to reinforce the Christian message of freely gifted, loving compassion, this last year we were treated on Christmas Eve to an episode of Fr Ted and in Christmas week to The Magic of Jesus, which the Radio Times eagerly proclaimed to be “good” because it promised to be “an irreverent show” in which magicians tried to reproduce the miracles of Jesus.
Shortly after Christmas the Oxford scientist, Richard
Dawkins, continued his evangelically atheistic attack on Christianity
in a programme entitled, “Deliver us from Evil,” in which
he persisted in his attempts to make Christianity look, not just perverse,
but actually a source of profound human wickedness. By contrast, he claimed
that scientific atheism was a source of great good and human benefaction.
I was left wondering if Dr Dawkins had ever read a history of the twentieth
century with it’s litany of mass murderers: Hitler, Stalin, Mao
Tse Tung, Pol Pot, all convinced atheists!
Pius XII and the media
In the late nineteen-nineties I first became aware of
the power of television to cause trouble and mischief, especially in relation
to the Catholic faith. At work one day I was harangued by a colleague
regarding a programme he had just seen on Pius XII and the holocaust.
I did not see the programme but according to my colleague it proved that
the pope was complicit with the mass murder of Jews in the holocaust.
That the wartime pope was anti-Semitic and kept quiet about the holocaust
because he wanted the Nazis to win against the Soviets. I was shocked
and dismayed by what was said and after saying that I thought the pope
had actually saved Jewish lives I beat a hasty retreat. I was hurt and
saddened. How could such a programme be made and broadcast? How could
my colleague believe it and use it to attack my faith and my Church?
I was determined to study Pius XII and to get to the bottom of what really
happened. This I was able to do in some detail when I spent a year at
Plater College. What was really going on in fact was that secularists
and even liberal Catholics were prepared to twist the truth to try and
discredit the papacy and undermine Catholic teaching on faith and morals.
Cornwell’s Hitler’s Pope is a example of this agenda. Even
the cover of Cornwell’s book is a shameless distortion. In fact
the date of the photo was 1929 years before Hitler came to power. Cardinal
Pacceli never met or spoke to Hitler nor did he as Pius XII. As if to
confirm the double standards of the liberal media Cornwell’s book
was excerpted in Vanity Fair and The Sunday Times and given rave reviews
in other newspapers across the world. Yet Rychlak’s Hitler, the
War, and the Pope; a thorough, well-research, devastating point-by-point
refutation of Cornwell’s allegation was virtually ignored. The same
fate has befallen other books that defend Pius XII most were not even
mentioned let alone reviewed. Yet other books that attack him were given
enthusiastic reviews.
The Pope did speak out and help the Jews but knew the best way in which to do it. He urged his nuncios throughout Nazi occupied Europe to save as many Jews as they could and supplied them with money to do so when he could. When Pope John XXIII, and later Pope Paul VI or others were thanked by the Jews for saving Jewish lives, they always said they were only doing what Pius XII told them and their duty. Pius XII knew that to speak out too loudly publicly would be a death sentence to many more Jews and their helpers. In fact Catholic monasteries and convents were bulging with Jewish refugees. There were even four thousand hidden between the Vatican and Castle Gandolfo. He was also aware of the Dutch Catholic bishops who did speak out publicly against the deportation of Dutch Jews to the death camps. This caused a Nazi clampdown and Holland lost more Jews that any other occupied country. Where as the country that surrounds the Vatican state, Italy, had the least Jewish deaths.
When liberal Catholics and the secular media attack the Church, it is the ordinary Catholics that bears the brunt of the results in the workplace and among friends and relations. SM for CUT
CUT’s recommended book for the Autumn of 2006
The Myth of Hitler’s Pope by Rabbi David G. Dalin
This is a remarkable new book well researched and thorough. Through contemporary documents and testimonies, Rabbi Dalin proves beyond all doubt that Pope Pius XII saved more Jews from Nazis than anyone else! It seems that some of Pius XII greatest defenders are the Jews themselves.
Rabbi Dalin points out that the liberal best-selling
attacks on the Pope are the work of those who wish to change the direction
of the Catholic Church and Liberal Catholics exploitation of the tragedy
of the Jewish people during the Holocaust for their own agenda must be
repudiated.
The Myth of Hitler’s Pope by Rabbi David G. Dalin, 2005, Regency
Publishing, can be obtained from Southwell Books (01823) 401193, Http://www.southwellbooks.com
or info@southwellbooks.com
CUT suggests give the licence fee to charity where it can do some good.
Here are some suggestions:
Or SPUC 5/6 Matthew Street, FREEPOST SW620, Westminster, London, SW1 2BR,.
Or Aid to the Church in Need 1 Times Square, Sutton, Surrey SM1 1LL.
Or Mother Teresa’s Missionaries of Charity, 112-116 St Georges Rd
London
Or Medical Missionaries of Mary, 12 Heronfield Way, Solihull, West Midlands,
B91 2NS
The Da Vinci Code Nonsense
Why are so many and the media convinced
by this drivel?
By Stefano
Mazzeo
There are many books, newspapers, films and TV programmes
that have an anti-Catholic slant and The Da Vinci Code is one of the most
ridiculous and yet vicious of this genre. Many Catholics thought it best to
ignore it at first as just one more attempt to discredit our Church by an
increasingly pagan, hostile, disrespectful and ignorant secular society.
However, this book has sold over two million copies in Britain alone (forty-
million world-wide) and has been made into a big budget Hollywood
film.
If media interest and book sales are anything to go by this film
will be received with enthusiastic reviews on the TV, the Radio and in the
press. It will top the film charts, and Catholics will once again be confronted
by non-Catholics to explain why our beliefs are different from the claims made
by the Da Vinci Code. We have decided to do a quick critique of the key
assertions made by Dan Brown in his book next to Catholic belief and historical
fact.
First, it is important to say that the Da Vinci Code is a work of fiction although it is supposed to be written against background historical fact, it even has a fact page at the beginning of the book. Usually writers of historical novels or books that refers to historical events get their basic facts right. For example when writing a book about the Second World War it is impossible to escape the fact that the Nazis murdered six million Jews. To suggest otherwise would be to have a criminally warped view of history. But Brown, it seems, has not bothered much with historical facts and documents and has based his book on a whole host of late twentieth century works such as the Holy Blood and the Holy Grail. After all why let the truth get in the way of your anti-Catholic prejudices? Incidentally authors of The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail recently tried to sue Dan Brown in the High Court for stealing their ideas. Someone recently pointed out if these books were based on historical fact and evidence no case could have been brought to court in the first place.
THE KEY ASSERTIONS IN THE DA VINCI CODE
(DVC)
The main characters in the book make a string of
anti-Catholic assertions. Most of these Catholic beliefs are the same for the
Orthodox and Protestants, although only the Catholic Church is attacked.
That Jesus and Mary Magdalene were
married
DVC claim: Jesus and Mary Magdalene were married and had a
child, that after the crucifixion, Mary and her child came to France where the
bloodline continued in the French royalty and still exists today. Plus that the
Catholic Church suppressed this knowledge. Evidence of this, it is claimed, can
be found in the Gnostic texts.
Historical fact: There is no proof that this ever happened. There are no ancient documents that say this. Even the Gnostic ‘gospels’ of Phillip or Mary do not say that they were married or that she was Jesus’ partner.
Gnosticism was the true Christianity
The DVC claims: Gnosticism was the original Christianity that
it was more inclusive, more in tune with the sacred feminine, and the Emperor
Constantine destroyed Gnosticism and its sacred feminine aspects and imposed a
more patriarchal Catholic Christianity.
Historical fact: the real Gnosticism is a difficult cult to define, for it was inconsistent in its beliefs and practices and borrowed from almost every cult and religion in the first centuries of Christianity. In essence, the Gnostic has a dualistic belief that all material is evil and only the spiritual is good, and that God did not create the world, instead this was done by a lesser ignorant creator. Man must escape it through `gnosis,’ or a kind of secret knowledge. Some Gnostics engaged in extremely promiscuous behaviour claiming they could not be stained by the material world. However, most forms of Gnosticism had a strong abhorrence of sex and marriage. They believe that the creation of woman was a source of evil, for women bore more souls into this world of darkness. So much for the sacred feminine as Dan Brown would have us believe, in fact the Gnostic ‘Gospel’ of Thomas (c150AD) states: “Simon Peter said to him, "Let Mary leave us, for women are not worthy of life." Jesus said, "I myself shall lead her in order to make her male, so that she too may become a living spirit resembling you males. For every woman who will make herself male will enter the kingdom of heaven."
The Emperor Constantine rewrote the Gospels to make Jesus God
The DVC claims: Constantine rewrote the four Gospels He did
this to make Jesus divine, therefore centring all power on himself and his
Church.
Historical evidence that counter this assertion:
a)
Evidence of the manuscripts.
There are in existence New Testament
manuscripts, which date from before the birth of Constantine c285, these agree
with manuscripts written after his death in 337. The Codex Vaticanus produced
c.350 AD, now kept in the Vatican Library, has its text on the Gospel of St John
Chapter 1, the incarnation of God clearly corroborated by a papyrus found at
Oxyrhynchus. This papyrus dates from the 3rd Century and has the text of John
chapters 1 and 20, it is now kept in the British Museum. There is also many
other pre-Constantine manuscripts, which correspond to the post Constantine New
Testament. The texts of these papyruses differ only slightly and mainly in
style, but do not affect the doctrines of the Church. In fact they confirm
them.
b) The citations of the Fathers.
Church
Fathers such as St Ignatius, St Irenaeus, and Origen made scriptural citations
from the Gospels up to 150 years before Constantine was born. Papias of
Hierapolis in c.125 AD writes for example, “Matthew compiled the Sayings in the
Aramaic language and everyone translated them as well as they could.” He also
states that Gospel of St Mark was written after Peter’s death in Rome, and that
“Mark, having become Peter’s interpreter, wrote down accurately whatever he
remembered of what was said or done by the Lord, however not in order.” Fr
Harrington SJ writing in the liberal `New Jerome Biblical Commentary’ agrees
that Mark wrote his Gospel in Rome because of the Latin words in the Greek text.
St Melito (d. c190) the bishop of Sardis, affirmed that Jesus was both God and
Man 100 years before Constantine was born.
Constantine defined the New Testament canon.
DVC claim: Constantine decided which books were to be in the New Testament then held the Council of Nicaea in 325 and had the Gnostic writings destroyed.
Historical fact: There were various canons of New Testament books in existence before Constantine’s time, they were mostly in agreement with the canon we have today but some books were disputed. The Muratorian canon (c200) had the four Gospels Acts, St Paul’s letters, St James, 1 & 2 John, St Jude, Revelation but also the revelation of St Peter. Hebrews and 2 Peter were also disputed. In other Churches the 1st letter of Pope St Clement 1 (c.95) was also considered inspired. It was a Pope who called for a council to define the canon at Rome in 382, which settled on the New Testament books we have to day. The council of Carthage 392 and of Hippo in 397 ratified the canon for the Pope. Constantine had nothing to do with it.
The Pope destroyed the Templars
DVC claim: While burrowing under the Temple Mount in Jerusalem the Templars found secret gospels, the diary of Mary Magdalene (presumably the one she must have written before moving to France) and the actual writings of Jesus! They used this information to blackmail the Vatican and became very wealthy. Pope Clement V then swung into action and arrested, tortured and murdered every Templar he could find. He then unceremoniously tossed the ashes of the Templars into the river Tiber.
Historical fact: The Knights Templar were
fighting monks, the order was founded in 1118 to fight in the Crusades and to
keep the Holy Land open for pilgrims. They took their white mantle from the
Catholic monastic order of the Cistercians and the Pope added a red cross over
the left breast. They were brave and devout but not scholarly. The Templars were
mostly from the lower nobility. After the Muslims expelled them from the Holy
Land they settled mainly in France and became Europe’s bankers. It was the King
of France, Philip IV who destroyed the Templars in 1307, and not the Pope. King
Philip IV, envious of the Templars great wealth and mindful of their power had
every Templar arrested, tortured, and many that did not confess to a series of
trumped up charges were executed. Clement V, a weak Pope, was only belatedly
informed. As for them finding secret documents under the Temple mount, Dan Brown
forgets that after the destruction of the Temple in AD70 the Romans, and then
the Arabs, got there first. After that, the Muslims would have found anything
left behind while building the Dome of the Rock.
Clement V lived in
exile in the South of France, at Avignon and never set foot in Rome. So we have
been speculating how he got the ashes to Rome in order to toss them
unceremoniously into the Tiber; perhaps he used one of Leonardo’s flying
machines?
The Priory of Sion
DVC claim: the Priory of Sion is an ancient European secret society and holds a great secret that would destroy the Catholic Church and the shake the foundations of the state. The secrets are ancient documents proving the bloodline of Jesus through the Kings and Queens of France to living heirs today. This bloodline is the real Holy Grail that Mary Magdalene was the first Holy Grail and that she arrived in France after the Crucifixion with her child by Jesus.
Historical Fact: four friends including Pierre Plantard founded the real Priory of Sion in 1956. Later members of the group including Plantard forged documents known as Les Dossiers Secrets and planted them in Paris’s Bibliotheque National. These documents contained information that Plantard himself was of this royal bloodline. After an investigation by the French authorities Plantard admitted it was hoax, he died in obscurity in 2000.
Opus Dei is the Pope's secret army
The DVC claims: that as a personal prelature Opus Dei is a personal army of the Pope. That it is an extra-legal operation not subject to the local Church authorities. One of the characters in the book, Silas is a “hulking albino” Opus Dei monk, who tries to kill members of the Priory of Sion and the other characters in the book, to stop the secret getting out.
The real Opus Dei does not have monks for it is not a religious order. Opus Dei , (which means God’s work) consists mainly of, lay people who have ordinary jobs like everyone else. They try and live a Christian life in the workplace therefore sanctifying their work and dedicate it to God no matter if it’s menial or skilled. The personal prelature is particular to the person his/herself and involves daily prayer and spiritual exercises; members of Opus Dei are subject to the local bishop like other Catholic laypeople.
Leonardo da Vinci
The DVC claims: that Leonardo da Vinci was a former grand master of the Priory of Sion. And in his painting the Last Supper in Monastery of Sta Maria delle Grazie, Milan, he gives a coded message by painting the figure on the right of Jesus with bosoms and no beard. Brown in his novel claims that this figure is Mary Magdalene.
Historical fact: Leonardo da Vinci was an artist a scientist and an inventor; he was not very interested in religion let alone the mumbo jumbo of Gnosticism. In later life he was reconciled to the Catholic Church and died a practising Catholic. Nothing has been found in his copious notes and drawings to suggest he had any interest in Gnosticism, secret societies or any special devotion to St Mary Magdalene. The person seated next to Jesus in Leonardo’s Last Supper is the youngest of the Apostles St John, art historians have always been in agreed on this. As we’ve already mentioned the Priory of Sion did not exist until 1956; therefore Leonardo da Vinci could not have been one of its Grand Masters, unless of course Leonardo also invented a secret time machine?
Conclusion
I asked why the media are so convinced by this drivel? I believe the Church’s teachings are opposite to their lifestyles and also attacking the Church is so very lucrative that any chance of a fair hearing for Catholics is improbable. As Olson and Miesel put it in their book, `The Da Vinci Hoax,’ “Whatever the cost to truth, the Church must be shown to be murderous, deceitful, and treacherous. Any stick will do for beating Catholics, even an invented one.” What can we do about it you may ask? We must become culture warriors and in all charity support our bishops and brethren who have the guts to stand up for the truth.
Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code has very little basis in historical fact; there is no evidence in ancient documents, scripture, traditions or archaeology to support any of its wild assertions. His book is simply the product of twentieth Century New Age mumbo jumbo together with modern society’s anti-Catholic bias. The book is based poor research and is quite frankly nonsense.
CUT’s recommended book:
The Da Vinci Hoax by Olson and Miesel. 2004 Ignatius,- form Family Publications, 6A King Street Jericho, Oxford, OX2 6DF, or from www.amazon.com For anyone wishing to read a compressive exposé of the errors in The Da Vinci Code. The Da Vinci Hoax is a also a good read in its own right. “The Definitive Debunking” – Francis Cardinal George, Archbishop of Chicago.
TOWARDS A PHILOSOPHY OF C.U.T.
(Catholics Unplug your Televisions)
By Dominic
Casey
C.U.T. is a pressure group to encourage persons of all persuasions or none, to do precisely that, unplug your televisions. It is basically ordinary Christians, namely Catholics who in trying to live out the Gospel see that a major impediment to this is the television. The television at the best of times could be an obstacle to the Gospel, even watching harmless programmes, used in excess. But now people have a more difficult scenario to deal with. That is the glut of sex, violence and anti-Catholic Christian programming, which is broadcast across the nation and further afield to Ireland.
Faced with this negative output by the BBC and others, it seems the most logical step is to unplug your television. That’s what C.U.T. wants to do; to highlight the negative programming that is being broadcast and viewers are subject to. This impacts on society as a whole with negative consequences. It hits at Christians and seeks to undermine the Christian message.
The proof of TV’s negative impact on society can be seen in the small nation that had previously no history of serious crime. But since the introduction of television in 1999 it has had numerous reports of serious crime. This small nation is Bhutan in the Himalayas. Television is an especially insidious piece of equipment as studies have shown how it acts on the human brain. Taking all these factors into account it is only right that TV be shown up for what it is an impediment to the Christian.
C.U.T. simply seeks to highlight these facts and ask people to consider giving up the TV and not pay their licences. There are other organizations, which seek to monitor TV programmes and write to TV companies complaining at the programmes that are being shown, CUT lauds these endeavours to seek that more decent programmes are transmitted, yet we have seen this process carry on for many years. What happens? Programming is becoming more salacious.
C.U.T. seeks to have viewers use their ‘Consumer Power’ and protest with their funds. Withdraw them from these unchristian broadcasters. This is what has an effect. It is estimated that up to 100,000 homes have not renewed their TV licence in the last year. This is not an insignificant number. This is what makes programme makers and station managers take note when they see that £12,000,000 has been wiped off their budget. They see that you are not going to take the trash they are throwing out. You are hitting them where it hurts and they will listen. Even if they don’t listen you are not providing them with the means to pollute people’s minds. It could be akin to, for instance, the church’s review of its investment in the arms trade following its ethical review.
The Catholic Church has no investment in the arms trade. As Christians can redirect their licence funds, these funds can be better used in charitable causes. C.U.T. is not a one-issue candidate running for election rather C.U.T. would, love God, love the Church, and love her teachings. How could one willingly support a cult that attacks Christianity? Loving God and His Church is the main thing. C.U.T. is a corollary of this. C.U.T. applauds all those engaged in the apostolate whether it is Pro-life, working for peace etc. Whatever the activists do in accord with the gospel. All for the greater honour and glory of God through Mary.
South Park’s depiction of Our Lady “Ugly and tasteless” New Zealand’s bishops call for boycott.
South Park, the controversial cartoon series not known for its taste or decency but more the use of childish humour coupled with adult themes, has produced an offensive episode regarding a statue of Our Lady. The episode entitled Bloody Mary depicts a statue of the Virgin Mary that bleeds. The South Park children then proclaim this to be a miracle, however Pope Benedict XVI intervenes and says it’s not a miracle after all but Our Lady is just menstruating.
The New Zealand Catholic bishops issued a letter calling for a boycott of C4 the New Zealand station that are showing it saying it is “ugly and tasteless” and the New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark said it sounded “revolting.” Channel 4, the station that usually carries South Park in Britain were noncommittal when questioned by a member of CUT regarding whether or not they will show this episode, but stated that they have not bought any new episodes of South Park since 2003 and have not shown any since 2005.
TV inspired Anti-Social Behaviour The latest buzzword appears to be ASBO that’s an acronym for Anti-Social Behaviour all to prevalent in today’s society. There has been an alarming rise in violent crime recently and the Home Office have produced statistics that show that the use of offensive weapons in violent crimes has risen to a quarter of all incidents. It is against this backdrop of rising crime that the Prime Minister Tony Blair has announced a number of proposals to curb Anti-Social Behaviour.
The TV and Anti-Social Behaviour
There appears to be more and more evidence that proves that what appears on the TV then happens in real life. Fantasy violence, cruelty, killing and maiming are far more common in society now than in 1955 before the arrival of the TV in every home.
The damaging effect of sex in the media
In a study produced for Mediawatch-uk, by scientist P. G. Nelson, shows a striking difference in a relatively TV free society of 1955 to the telly-saturated society of 2002. For example Sex attacks on women and girls per thousand in 1955 was 0.3 this has soared in 2002 to 1.4. Pregnancy among under 14 year old girls per thousand has risen from 0.1 to 1.1 in 2002 and Sexually transmitted infections have risen from 0.7 to a colossal 2.1 per thousand in 2002 despite sex education and a society infested by condoms.
Is the TV fundamentally flawed? By allowing the TV in your home you give access to you and your family those who rarely have the family’s interest at heart. The TV is the single most powerful tool for influencing society, survey after survey has proved this. We have no doubt that most of the major ills of the modern world are the result of the nefarious influence of the Television. Yes, we believe the TV is fundamentally flawed and should be shunned by every caring parent. Even if you are extremely vigilant with what you and yours see, you will still be subject to the behaviour of other TV watchers. So throw the TV out join the silent revolution, thousands are and we will soon have an effect on the TV moguls by hitting them where it really hurts, in their pockets.
The media’s devastating effect on the Church
Throughout the last three years CUT has pointed out the anti-Catholic bias of the media in Britain. We were fearful particularly because of the strong influence of the TV. This influence by the TV on society has been well documented in triggering violent crime and sexualising society as our previous article has shown. Yet the TV, particularly the BBC and Channel 4, seem to have targeted the Catholic Church almost alone, accusing it of causing the AIDS crises in Africa, when we know full well that only Catholic teaching on abstinence has actually worked. You simply cannot catch or pass on AIDS by following Catholic Teaching. TV producers have singled out our priesthood in paedophile cases. We are not saying that this did not happen and we pray for those priests and particularly for their victims. However, the vast majority of Catholic clergy are honest decent holy men who have sacrificed their life’s work for the Church.
However, there are many cases where non-Catholic clergy’s similar misdemeanours are ignored by the national media and only make the local news, this has not been the case for Catholics. The Newspapers particularly the Independent and the Guardian have been particularly hateful when reporting on Catholic affairs. This has led many of us to note that “hate crimes” are allowed as long as they are against Catholics. The sad fact is most people cannot think for themselves they need to be told what to think and cannot see through the “spin” of the TV producers or their agenda. Bearing all this in mind we were devastated to find that the Catholic Church has lost 150,000 mass goers in the last three years in Britain. We believe this is mostly the direct result of the TV’s attacks on our Church.
Why you may ask do we think that the media and the TV in particular have singled out the Catholic Church for attacks? The answer we believe is the same now as it was three years ago, Catholic teaching that abortion is the killing of the innocent, that euthanasia is gravely wrong that homosexually is a grave disorder and that women simply cannot be priests. These beliefs come straight from Sacred Scripture and the Traditions of the Church - and cannot be changed. However, modern secular Society led by the nose by the media would have us believe otherwise.
Is the BBC Homophobic?
Stonewall the “Gay” rights group that disrupts Catholic
processions occasionally have accused the BBC of being homophobic! Just because
of a few harmless “Gay” jokes by Jeremy Clarkson and one or two others. Of all
the accusations levelled at the BBC, being called homophobic is the least
credible.
Richard Littlejohn in the Daily Mail on the 3-03-06 writes,
“Every soap has at least one gay storyline. Just about every makeover show has a
gay presenter or contestant. No property programme is complete without a happy
smiling homosexual couple poking around the soft furnishings. From Graham Norton
to Miriam Margolyes, gays and lesbians are prominent on mainstream TV. Arguably
homosexuals are seriously over-represented on television.”
Would that Catholics had the same treatment - a devout Catholic in every soap opera, a makeover show with an orthodox Catholic presenter or contestant, - “could we have the votive lamp near the niche with the statue of Our Lady by the photo of the Pope, please?” A property programme looking for a home for a devout Catholic family of ten would be interesting. Arguably Catholics who practice their faith are seriously under-represented on the television.
One wonders why then are Stonewall attacking the BBC, arguably
their greatest ally? Perhaps it is to purge the BBC of even poking harmless fun
at homosexuals? As some people believe that the BBC is a veritable temple to the
“Gay” perhaps this is no more than a squabble in the vestry but we couldn’t
comment on that?
CUT suggests we give the licence fee to charity where it
can do some good. Here are some suggestions:
Peters Pence – His
Holiness Pope Benedict XVI 0120 Vatican City State, Europe.
Or SPUC 5/6
Matthew Street, FREEPOST SW620, Westminster, London, SW1 2BR.
Or Aid to
the Church in Need 1 Times Square, Sutton, Surrey SM1 1LL.
Or EWTN Global
Catholic TV Network, Sky channel 769, send donations to keep this channel on the
air to St Clare Media (EWTN) Ltd, (Charity No. 1080782), Po Box 913, Enfield EN2
0WY. Ireland: St Brigid Media Ltd. (Charity No. 15025), PO Box 352, Limerick.
Teenage girls consider the porn industry for work
In a recent survey of 1000 British girls aged between 15 and 20, it was found that a majority would work in the burgeoning porn industry. The article, printed in The Sunday Times (18/9/2005), entitled, 'Mummy, I want to be a porn star' by Kira Cochrane, said that 63% would work as glamour models and 25% preferred the idea of lap dancing. Whilst we do not believe everything written in the newspapers and we hope that most young people brought up as Christians would not enter this sordid world, there appears to be truth in the story - for porn is everywhere.
Brainwashed by the TV
Perhaps these statistics are not surprising considering the standards of TV broadcasts into their parent’s living rooms since they were children. There is plenty of work for these teenage ‘porn stars’, twenty-seven TV channels are wholly dedicated to hard core porn; and there are dozens of ‘girly’ magazines, many newspapers and other magazines carry photos of women in soft porn poses. The mainstream TV stations have dramas in which some scenes are little more than pornographic. Our ‘respected’ national public service broadcaster, the BBC seems to make pornography ‘acceptable’ with dramas like ‘Rome,’ which shows scenes of violent sex. Channel Four seems to be trying to carve out a low life niche for itself below the other mainstream channels. However, in this culture of sex and death, it is the Internet that has become the largest supplier of pornography. How has all this become acceptable? If it is not acceptable why is there not a cry of protest that would make the Minister of Culture Media and Sport fear for her job?
The slow but sure corrupting of society
There is an old adage that a frog would never jump into boiling water. However, put the frog in a bowl of cold water and slowly bring it to the boil, the frog would not try and escape until it was too late and die. The same principle can be applied to the viewing public; what is now acceptable was once unimaginable. This has crept up on us so slowly people hardly knew it was happening. Long before the arrival of the personal computer and Internet, the work of breaking down common decency, natural law and Christian morality was accomplished.
The engineers of moral collapse
Programmes such as:- `That Was The Week Than Was,’ `Monty Python’ and others mocked authority and the accepted norms. ‘Well I didn’t expect the Spanish Inquisition!’ became the jocular Monty Pythonesque catch phrase, whenever anyone’s TV induced views were questioned. Dramas shown on The `Play for Today’ sometimes had a psychologically disturbing edge to them. Even quasi-religious programmes such as `Heart of the Matter’ and `Everyman’ seemed to question Christian values. The soap operas with scripts that normalise society’s vulgar underbelly are so angry and aggressive - no wonder that the Government has announced in a nation-wide media event, of new plans to curb anti-social behaviour. Sorry Mr Blair and Ms Jowell, `East Enders’ and the TV producers are better at social engineering than you are. Its only when you stop and reflect on what’s been lost that you realise you’ve been fooled. Society no longer has the values it once had and it was all lost in the front room.
Christian values forgotten
Yet the Gospel has not changed and the Ten Commandments have not been rewritten, Jesus’ love for us has not diminished. But has modern society forgotten Jesus and has rejected Christian ethics of love and moral law? Pope Benedict in his Urbi et Orbi address said: “But men and women in our technological age risk becoming victims of their own intellectual and technical achievements, ending up in spiritual barrenness and emptiness of heart.”
A Pornified society
Now we have blatant and unchecked porn on the computer and on
the TV and in print everywhere, we have a ‘Pornified’ society. In a new book by
Pamela Paul entitled ‘Pornified’ she writes that the porn industry is worth
£31.5 billion globally. But the biggest problem with porn usage is in the West.
In Europe and North America it has reached epidemic proportions. For example,
Hollywood makes 400 feature films and 11,000 porn films annually. A Hollywood
blockbuster costs about $150 million, but porn is very cheep and profitable, for
most pornographic films cost between $5,000 and $10,000. To make a porn film one
only needs a camera two girls and a sofa. Porn viewing is increasing all the
time with almost a third of all pay-per-view revenue being generated by porn. An
MSNBC.com survey found that three quarters of all American men had viewed or
downloaded porn films and videos from the Internet and 41% of women.
Some
men who have been viewing porn for over ten years find it difficult to stay
aroused when having sex with a woman. They have become desensitised and need to
think of porn scenes. Some women complain that their husbands are not really
with them. They are just being used and objectified. The men themselves need to
find more explicit porn, more violent, strange and perverse that they become
disconnected from their wives. Their wives have been replaced by porn. Ten years
ago porn was hardly ever cited in divorce cases now it plays a significant
role.
The London School of Economics found that 60% of children that use the Internet regularly come in contact with porn. The pornographers are very devious and actually target them with deceptive URLs or linking porn sites to sites of child’s interests. By the time young men reach the age of sixteen they are incapable of having, what secular society calls a ‘normal relationship’ with a woman. In a porn film a man just needs to touch a woman and she is wreathing in ecstasy. In real life it’s not quite like that and young men believe there something wrong with their girl -friends and vice versa.
Porn has seeped into the mainstream, when a porn star like Ron Jeremy can make regular appearances on the university lecture circuit and is mobbed by children and parents alike at Disney World Orlando, one wonders if there is any sanity left.
Is a normal man now a rarity?
Its getting difficult for a woman to find a normal man one who has not been infected by the pornography. More men than ever are addicted to porn, spending hours in a trance-like state in front of the TV or computer, lost in self-gratification. Porn users employ the same language as drug addicts saying that they use porn to get high. As time goes by they need to use more explicit ultra perverse porn to get the same effect for they have become dependant on upon the endorphin and adrenaline the brain releases during porn usage. Many of the obsessed - desperate for that euphemistic click, end up viewing homosexual porn, bestiality and child porn. You may believe that these men are an extremely perverted few. However, Nicolas Martin of the Daily Telegraph (21-07-04) wrote “BT Blocks 20,000 attempts a Day to access Child Porn.” As BT is only one of a number of ISPs, the number that get through is probably several times that.
What can be done?
At CUT we believe without hesitation there is only one solution
either throw the TV out or detune all channels except EWTN. We are not stopping
free speech, there’s very little speech in porn, and those who control secular
TV have treated the Church and those who object to TV’s excesses and bias with
contempt, reserving free speech for themselves.
The Internet needs to be
treated as if it is radioactive. If you must have it, keep your computer in a
high traffic area and install a filter. Software such as Firewall can provide
the role of a filter. But don’t kid yourself that you have solved the problem,
any twelve year old brought up with computers can get around a filter. If you
leave your child alone with the Internet he will view porn either by mistake or
through curiosity.
Sex, Christians believe, is God’s wedding present to a husband and his wife, but this great gift has been stolen and corrupted and served up on a screen. The statistics and the article subtitled `A Pornified society,’ is based on the book called `Pornified (How pornography is transforming our lives, our relationships, and our families)’ by Pamela Paul, Time Books, 2005, £12.99, Http://www.amazon.com .Anyone concerned regarding pornography and its devastating effect on society needs to read this book. Written from a non-religious point of view it is the true horror story of today. Jesus said: “If your right eye causes you to sin pluck it out and throw it away; it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body be thrown into hell” (Matt 5:29).
Bhutan, the last country to get TV – has its first crime wave
Bhutan, an untouched kingdom high up in the snowy Himalayan
Mountains has let the modern materialistic world pass it by. All seemed serene,
but then came an event that shattered this peace. Kat Byles of New Consumer
magazine (2006) wrote: “A couple of years ago I discovered how Bhutan, an
ancient Buddhist land tucked away in the Himalayan Mountains, became the last
nation in the world to get TV in 1999. An untouched snowy kingdom in the sky
bombarded by 46 TV channels, courtesy of Rupert Murdoch. It was swiftly followed
by the nation’s first crime wave – violence, drug and alcohol offences,
shoplifting, fraud, even murder. What was TV doing to humankind? My soul was
crying.”
If a case ever needs to be made for the evil influence of TV upon
mankind then Bhutan must be a sad example.
Dr Aric Sigman in his book Remotely Controlled: How Television is Damaging Our Lives – and what to do about it, says. “By the age of 75 most of us will have spent 12 and a half years doing nothing but watching the television. A six year old child will have spent nearly one year in front of the TV.” There is disturbing new scientific evidence that a child may have its education process permanently hindered, for the TV has stunted the brain’s development.
Remotely Controlled £9.99 is published by Vermillion. New Consumer magazine are giving away three copies visit their website:
http://www.newconsumer.org/competitions
A Tale of Two TV Dramas -
Bleak House and Rome
It has always been CUT policy that whenever the TV companies make a good drama or programme that’s beneficial and entertaining to the viewing public we say so. The BBC Television adaptation of Charles Dickens’ Bleak House is one such programme. I managed to see it around a relation’s house and I found some of the scenes very moving and the whole work to be in the tradition of the great costume dramas of the past.
However, just when you thought it might be worth paying the licence fee again and turning the TV on, they hit you with Rome. Rome and Jerry Springer the Opera has made 2005 an extremely poor year for the Christian licence payer. A CUT supporter tried to watch Rome but found it impossible for a Christian to view. Within the first forty-minutes there was explicit violence and violent sex. Some historians have also pointed out that the essence of the drama is simply not historically truthful. Yes, ancient Rome did have moments of extreme violence as has all civilisations. Even in Dickens’ time, riots and even fornication were not rare, as the existence of the illegitimate heroine of Bleak House – Ester, testifies this. However, the modern scriptwriters of Rome made violence and sensation the reason for their drama, whereas a true genius such as Dickens makes the people and the plot the centre. The sex and violence in BBC’s Rome can only further desensitise and brutalise Western Society that has lost its sense of harmony.
The Italian TV station RAI of modern day Rome, in who’s studios some of the scenes of Rome were shot, has had to cut and edit the BBC’s version of ancient Rome saying it just too violent and explicit of their viewers. The licence fee brings in almost £3 billion per annum, so perhaps we should expect five episodes of Bleak House per year and not one every five years. Even if this were to be the case, there would still too much sex and violence, and far too much politically correct social engineering. We would still have ‘Reality TV’, boring makeovers, soap operas (that act like a dummy for the brain), and documentaries that treat the truth with plenty of ‘spin.’ This would be too much for us ever to contemplate having the BBC, Channel 4 or any of the other secular channels back in the house.
Is the BBC in bed with the IPPF?
The BBC’s `Sexwise’ website along with BBC World Service, under the banner of sexual and reproductive rights, gives advice on contraception and abortions to the world. It does this in conjunction with its partner in this field, the International Planned Parenthood Federation the IPPF. Has the BBC taken on to itself the mantle of world abortion rights? Its partner the IPPF made a profit of $36 million for performing abortions in the USA in 2003 alone.
Planned Parenthood is the world’s largest provider of abortions. Can Catholics continue to support the BBC either by the licence fee or any other way when in conjunction with such an organisation they support the killing of the most innocent people on earth – the unborn. Margaret Sanger the founder of Planned Parenthood was a known advocate of eugenics and wrote in her book `Birth control and Women’s Health:’
“...Our pensions, hospitals, and even our drainage and sanitary
equipment all tend to keep alive the sickly and the weak, who are allowed to
propagate and in turn produce a race of degenerates.”
The IPPF would have us
believe eugenics was a side issue for Sanger. However, her `Birth Control
Review’ (which, Sanger edited between 1917 to 1938) would often carry one of her
favourite slogans “Birth Control: To Create a Race of Thoroughbreds.”
How does all this apply today? Well there are countries in the world whose people use a combination of birth control, scanning technology and abortion to have male children. In China, for instance there is a shortage of girls, for most families in that one child per family state would rather have a boy. It is ironic that those who bang the pro-choice or sexual and reproductive rights drum in the UN, the EU, and on the BBC etc are feminists and their supporters.
MEDIAWATCH-UK - going strong but needs your help
At CUT we believe the only way to improve the TV is to give it up. That’s not a joke, for we believe that the TV companies will only really listen to the protests of the people if they are denied funds and influence. However, there is an organisation, which has, almost single handily held the torch for media decency and family values on the TV for the last 40 years. This organisation was founded by the late great Mary Whitehouse as the `National Viewers and Listeners Association;’ and is now called Mediawatch-uk. Its director John C Beyer has recently said that they need more support if they are to remain independent, if any CUT supporter would like to help them please contact:
John C Beyer, Director, Mediawatch-UK, 3 Willow House, Kennington Road, ASHFORD, Kent, TN24 0NR.
Tel: 01233 633936 Fax: 01233 633836 E-mail:
info@mediawatchuk.org Web: http://www.mediawatchuk.org/
CUT’s recommended book:
Mother Angelica by Raymond Arroyo. (Doubleday 2005). This is a truly wonderful book about a remarkable woman. It shows how she took a leading role in Catholic broadcasting and remained loyal and orthodox. Read how against all the odds a Poor Clare nun set up a global Catholic TV and Radio network.
HOW ABOUT JOINING THOSE WHO HAVE GIVEN UP THE TV?
HERE’S SOME GOOD REASONS TO GET RID OF THE TV THIS AUTUMN:
Offcom – Television watchdog has abandoned standards This organisation continues to fail to safeguard the TV viewing public from sex and violence; they now have allowed the “F” and “C” word but only with justification! CUT – ‘Does his mean never?’
BBC 1 – ‘Rome’ (Sexually explicit and very violent). The Daily Express reported on the 22-08-05 that ‘Rome’ cost £58 million - £9 million provided by the BBC and that it has some of the most violent scenes ever seen on British TV. The story revolves around the fall of the Roman Republic in 52BC with full-frontal nudity, blood-soaked brutality and obscene language. However, historian Jeremy Catto said “Rome was a pretty po-faced patriarchal society which favoured women of modest virtue.” – CUT ‘looks like they have gone for the worst aspects rather than balance once again.’
BBC 3 – Titty bang bang. Including a programme on Lesbian lion
tamers. BBC 3’s controller said he was “slightly nervous about it”. - CUT ‘He
should be ashamed of himself.’
Porn. We now have 27 Channels! (See article
below)
BRITAIN THE SHAMEFUL ADULT TV CAPITAL OF EUROPE
The above headline was not written by CUT but by the Daily Mail
on the 15/9/2005. In the subsequent article they went on to say that there are
now 27 wholly dedicated porn channels. In Britain we have five times more
adult-only channels than anywhere else in Europe. The list includes a “Gay” TV
channel.
Across Europe there are 84 porn channels in total. Germany has five,
the French have four the Spanish have two, the Italians, and the other countries
one.
The main providers of pornographic channels in Britain are Playboy,
which has six and Richard Desmond who has 12 channels. These channels have names
such as Television X and a whole series of Red Hot *** channels, (we’ve decided
not to give the Red Hot stations names in full).
These channels are only available on subscription with a PIN number. Television X has around 400,000 viewers paying around £10 per month. Adult sex can only be shown between 10pm and 5.30am. However, they can show ‘tasters’ on free to air before 10pm. The regulators are concerned at the ease with which children can access this material but nothing is done about it.
CONVICTED PAEDOPHILE JONATHAN KING GIVEN AIRTIME
One morning last July, I turned on BBC Radio 5 Live and to my amazement I heard Jonathan King being given a public platform to defend himself. The `Pop Mogul’ - King, given seven years for abusing boys was the guest of Victoria Derbyshire on her morning show. Twenty-five listeners complained after King was able to use the programme to vigorously put forward his views.
The BBC later apologised and issued a statement and said that the interview was meant to examine “the possibility that his state of mind was typical of perpetrators of paedophile crimes.” I must admit it didn’t sound like that to me but, it did sound like the BBC started to panic halfway through the programme due to the phone-ins, which questioned the reasons behind the programme. One listener seemed to imply that the whole BBC homosexual friendly mafia was behind it, although we couldn’t comment on that.
The TV licence fee funds BBC Radio 5 Live and whilst it was excellent regarding the Ashes Test series, it appears to treat information on events like ‘Gay’ pride marches in the same way as football matches. This sounds like social engineering.
CHANNEL 4’S DISTORTION OF POPE BENEDICT AND CATHOLIC TEACHING - GOD’S ROTTWEILER
At CUT we have been contacted many times regarding recent media distortion of Pope Benedict’s image, particularly regarding the Channel 4 programme God’s Rottweiler. We came to the conclusion at CUT long ago, that this is all we can expect from the secular media. The media particularly many in TV and film have a different set of beliefs, rules and standards to Christianity. If the Catholic Church faithfully stands up for the religion of Jesus Christ, history has shown us that the Powers and Principalities of this world will attack us. After all they crucified our founder.
This does not mean that we should put up with it, for Jesus came to give us a sword in a spiritual sense for the Kingdoms sake, Cf. Matt 10:34. Yes, we must turn the other cheek, but turn the other cheek to someone who understands what this action means. There is no point in turning the other cheek to someone who has a gun - that would be suicide. There is no point in continually turning the TV on and subject yourself to this kind of anti-Catholic bias. It is clear that the media will only respect those who stand up for them-selves and fight back. It is quite simple how to do this, throw the TV out and deny the TV producers the oxygen of influence and funds.
The programme opened with pictures of Pope Benedict, then cut to images of what looked like the Ku Klux Klan or students being beaten by police with a background of sinister music. Throughout the programme Channel 4 was using very base tactics to try to appear to be balanced, but to do as much damage as possible. To say they do not like the Pope is an understatement. They then wheel out the usual aging ‘Catholic’ hippies such as Lavinia Byrne and Hans Kung to spout their pro-PC mantra. Lavinia Byrne (A favourite among those who take the Pill) claimed that Vatican II taught us to go with the aspirations of our heart and that this was important to God. Fr Marsden of the Catholic Times said that this is just plain stupid. To us at CUT it sounds like New Age twaddle. This is a gross misrepresentation of Church teaching. You can clearly see in this programme, the misused power of the TV, to influence both Catholics and non-Catholic - to disparage Catholic teaching. However, there is glimmer of hope, TV ownership is going down!
TV IN EUROPE - PUERILE, RUDE AND CRUDE
Some people believe we only criticise British TV, but this is not the case. For we have also featured Irish and American TV. So we have decided to have a quick look at Europe.Germany like all countries has its handful of good programmes, but there are also quite a number that are rude and crude. Take for example, RTL’s Freitag Nacht News with its slapstick nudity, its crude reflections on the news, featuring politicians with ‘airbrushed in’ private parts that talk! The stations Autohändler features a used car lot with a group of likely lads trying to sell a load of dodgy cars. They constantly break wind and play boorish pranks on one another, just right for a Sunday afternoon!
During World Youth Day in Cologne another German channel decided to concentrate on people distributing condoms and a defiant anti-Catholic parade. However, between the editing it was clear that they were mostly ignored to the credit of the young people. One strange feature is the adult nature of some of the adverts shown during the day.
Italian TV is little better, with occasional nudity - its glitzy sets and strident bimbos. Sometimes it’s difficult to distinguish between a quiz show a variety show or a football talk show. The football shows have the usual group of aging ex-football stars arguing from behind a desk, but it has one extra feature from your usual Match of the Day type of set. The girl who sits on a stool with her legs crossed smiling at the camera with pen poised over note pad, not very PC. She never actually writes anything or says much, perhaps her job is to take the average Italian football supporters mind off the fact that the Italian national team hasn’t won anything for ages?
Italian TV has improved in recent years perhaps as result of a national viewers strike sometime ago. Italian TV does have two Catholic religious soap operas one involving a sleuth priest who helps the Carabinere. It also carries News about the Church and the Holy Father, and does not attack the Protestant faiths,unlike the treatment of Catholicism by the Northern European and American stations.‘RAI News 24’ has fair and straight forward news. Also, there are three Catholic channels, the Vatican’s Telepace & Sat2000 and Tele Padre Pio.
THANKS FOR THE WONDERFUL RESPONSE TO OUR CALL FOR FUNDS
As I said in the September CUT briefing, once a year in the Autumn we will have a call for funds. I would like to thank all who responded, for your support and to report that the call was successful, for we exceeded last years amount. The call for funds was necessary because your British Co-ordinator has had to personally fund most of the campaign costing several hundred pounds. Although there is no question of abandoning the campaign, when we are having people contact us and throw the TV out etc, the funds will help us fight a more effective campaign.
Regarding the questions we asked our supporters; the majority do not think a more formal membership is necessary, but would rather continue, as we are distributing leaflets and newsletters as and when we can. We had some interesting ideas for campaigns like advertising or protesting in front of TV offices etc and prayer. I’m afraid we cannot afford advertising for our campaign at the moment. As for as protesting, some of our supporters occasionally support Mediawatch-uk and Mediamarch. As the thrust of our campaign is to ask people to give up the TV we do not believe that this type of protest is for us as a group. We would like to you to continue to pray for our work, and also for the media, particularly those poor souls involved in the porn industry and those who are addicted to watching it. We suggest that we all daily pray for the broadcasting media and that people will reject the TV, until families can once again sit down together and watch it unharmed.
Please contact us if you have any comment on the TV and if you would like to distribute our newsletter or leaflet let us know how many you would like.
Finally, in a last call for funds, your British Co-ordinator will still need your help. So if you haven’t contributed and would like to help please send it to
CUT, Waun Llydan, St David’s Well, Llananno, Powys, LD1 6YP, Great
Britain.
With prayers,
Stefano Mazzeo
CUT’S RECOMMENDED BOOK:
Although we campaign for Catholics to throw the TV away we still love the arts – provided its compatible with Christianity.
Shadowplay by Clare Asquith
The Hidden Beliefs and Coded
Politics of William Shakespeare
(PublicAffairs, 2005)
Was Shakespeare a Catholic and his plays full of
pro-Catholic codes? Read this compelling and convincing new book and get a truer
picture of what really happened in England during the Reformation. How
Shakespeare communicated with his suppressed, but pro-Catholic audience during
the horrors of Elizabethan England.
Issue 9 Summer 2005
Some claimed that the late Holy Father caused orphans in Africa because the Church has refused to endorse condoms to prevent AIDS; this has been the slant taken by much of the popular press, which is total nonsense. Uganda, because it adopted the Catholic stand of chastity and abstinence outside marriage now has the lowest rate of increase in the area However, South Africa which has adopted the condom as it main weapon against AIDS has found that new cases are being reported at an alarming rate. I would also like to cite the example of Thailand and the Philippines. Both countries found they had AIDS at about the same time. Thailand tried deal with the problem by adopting a vigorous campaign of “100% Condom Use” while in the Philippines the Church and government opposed “the condom program and sexual promiscuity”. Today Thailand has 750,000 cases of HIV/AIDS and the Philippines has only 1,935 – and this considering that the Philippines population is around 30% greater than Thailand’s! You simply cannot spread or catch AIDS if you follow Catholic teaching, which is that sex should be between a man and a woman and only if they are married.
The newspapers have been really bad particularly about the election of Benedict XVI. If they could see the reaction of the German press, who have been really shocked regarding calumnies of their colleges in the Britain perhaps they may have thought before printing the disgraceful headlines and articles.
Interview with John C Beyer – Director of
Mediawatch-uk
By Stefano Mazzeo of Catholics Unplug your
Televisions
SM - What inspired you to become involved with Mediawatch?
JCB - I became involved in the National Viewers’ and Listeners’ Association, renamed Mediawatch-uk in March 2001 in 1973, after reading Mary Whitehouse’s first book entitled ‘Cleaning Up TV – From Protest to Participation’. After reading this book I came to understand that the media does have a bearing on all other moral and ethical issues that concern many people: - including Christians. The media does seem to have an agenda to promote secular humanism and I felt that this was a bias that could be opposed by working towards better standards of behaviour in television programmes, particularly films and drama.
SM - Did your Catholic faith have anything to do with it?
JCB - The Catholic Church has comprehensive social teaching on the means of communication dating back to the 1940s when an Encyclical Letter on Sound Broadcasting was published. Then in the early fifties another Encyclical Letter on Television and Film was issued drawing attention to the power of these developments to shape and influence beliefs and ideas. In addition to welcoming the marvellous technological advances, the Pope drew attention to the dangers of immoral presentations and the role that all right thinking people could play in ensuring that television is a force for good. The Second Vatican Council also dealt fully with the means of communication and since then the Bishops of England and Wales have issued important pastoral instructions on the right use of the media and the role of the Laity. The Catholic Church celebrates the media on Communications Sunday every year in May and this provides a focus on these matters for the ‘catholic in the pew’. For this day in 1994 Pope John Paul II issued a strong pastoral letter drawing attention to the global impact of television and warning about the promotion of moral relativism and the portrayal of false ideologies and improper role models. All of these documents call upon the Laity to play an active role in helping to achieve programming that is not an affront to human dignity and more in keeping with the norms revealed in the Gospels. The Laity is encouraged to do this by praising good material and protesting about the bad. It is also stated that broadcasting institutions ought to create proper mechanisms through which the opinions and concerns of viewers and listeners can be heard and taken into account.
SM - There has been a long history of protest against the showing of offensive material on the TV, do you believe things are getting worse?
JCB - I believe that any objective assessment of television programming could not reach any conclusion other than that there is much more offensive material on screen than ever before, so much so that it has become normalised and many people simply do not notice it. Of course, it is true that there are many more channels and most are continuously on air. It is also true that there is much that is good and praiseworthy. Our concern in NVALA and mediawatch-uk has always been primarily with ‘taste and decency’ and ‘offence to public feeling’ issues. Given what some channels transmit it is evident that there is very little in the way of regulatory constraint. Everything is justified in terms of context, scheduling and whether any offence caused is “widespread”. Channel 4, especially, has done a very great deal to overthrow standards by its promotion, over the years, of pornography, swearing and profanity, violence and general coarseness on the pretext that it is part of their public service remit to “cater for tastes not catered for elsewhere”. Five has also been at the forefront of pushing back boundaries and from the outset their programme remit included “erotic” films. Sadly, other mainstream channels have followed suit by including offensive programming and now, of course, there are around 30 licensed satellite and cable channels devoted entirely to pornography. This situation has come about because successive governments have not taken the trouble to legislate effectively, have not intervened to safeguard standards when the regulators have given in to the demands of the industry and the viewing public has largely failed to protest. The preferred option has been to “switch off”.
SM - Why do you believe things are getting worse and in what areas?
JCB - Programmes are getting worse so far as swearing, profanity, sexual conduct and violence are concerned. These aspects of programmes seem to become more commonplace as time passes especially in film and drama. Warnings about “strong” language seem to preface more and more programming and those “celebrities” who swear and behave badly are given awards and attend parties with royalty and high-ranking politicians; and are afforded huge publicity for their misdemeanours. Such adulation enhances their status as role models.
SM - Do you believe that the influence of immorality on the TV has a detrimental effect on society?
JCB - Yes, I do believe that television influences society in ways that are both good and bad. Good drama, documentary, sport, music and so on, can edify audiences. Good news and current affairs can inform, educate and good entertainment can bring joy and satisfaction that we are being respected. Bad behaviour on television and bad role models set poor example and the social effects can be seen everywhere in terms of social violence, crime and disorder, marital infidelity and breakdown and inarticulacy - and this at a time of ever increasing expenditure on education and emphasis on communication skills. We have always said that portraying violence in entertainment increases social violence and aggressiveness, that marital infidelity and casual sexual relations increases breakdown and permissive behaviour, which contributes to the crises of “street” crime and Sexually Transmitted Infections. John Humphrys, the Radio 4 presenter, recently observed that what is normal on television becomes normal in society. We believe that this is true and ought to be acknowledged more widely.
SM - Do you feel the Catholic hierarchy and other religious leaders speak out enough against the immorality in the media?
JCB - I do believe that religious leaders could do more to draw attention to and oppose immorality that is presented as entertainment. We welcomed, and agreed with, the criticism expressed by the Archbishop of Canterbury last year about the ITV series ‘Footballers Wives’. The late Cardinal Hume observed in 1997 that the media is in the “values business” and the pre-election document ‘The Common Good’, published in that year, drew attention to the “incremental” decline in standards, which if no one took responsibility, would result in a situation where standards simply did not exist. This was a very perceptive section in the document that was not widely embraced or publicised. I have always felt that the influence of television in particular has been under emphasised by the churches. There is clearly an imbalance between the 10 or 15 minute Sunday homily and the hours spent every week imbibing the values and world view of television and film producers which is often at odds with the beliefs, doctrines and social and moral teaching of the Christianity and other world religions.
SM - What would you say to those apologists for immorality who claim that by allowing pornography to be legally made and shown on TV, they regulate it therefore eliminating the excesses of porn. Or do you believe that the excesses still exist, and if they do, are these excesses even more common?
JCB - I do not agree that pornography should be legal bearing in mind that the Obscene Publications Act 1959 was intended to “strengthen” the law to make such material illegal provided it could be proved that it “tends to deprave and corrupt those likely to see it”. The inability to prove this, except in rare prosecutions of the most extreme material, has made much that is obscene beyond the reach of the law. It is for this reason that we have campaigned consistently for the law to be strengthened with an enforceable definition of what is obscene. Pornography is only available so widely because the law has failed to fulfil Parliaments intention to make it illegal. The Human Rights Act, with its provisions on “freedom of expression”, has made the situation worse; and the publication of obscene imagery on the Internet means that the likelihood of any legal constraints on obscene material get ever more remote unless politicians are left in no doubt that their seats depend upon effective safeguards against it. That is why we believe that obscenity ought to be an issue at General Election time.
SM - What do you say to those who use euphemisms like ‘free speech’ and are afraid that campaigners such as CUT and Mediawatch would like to put society in a narrow ‘strait jacket’ regarding the arts?
JCB - I agree with the right to free speech but I do not consider that pornography and obscenity should be included given that the Human Rights Act permits the government to establish safeguards on “health and morals”. All freedoms have corresponding duties and responsibilities and these are the proper “strait jacket” that should be in place. Those who say that we are imposing “censorship” are usually those with a vested financial or ideological interest that is self-serving rather than expressed with a desire to promote the common good. Duties and responsibilities and proper accountability do not enter into it and I believe they should.
SM - There are many who believe that the hedonistic excesses of Ancient Roman ‘entertainment’ are echoed by the excesses of Western media? Do you believe that Western Culture is heading the same way?
JCB - Historians generally agree that the Roman Empire collapsed because the ruling classes became corrupted and preoccupied with hedonism. They gradually became unable to resist overthrow because their morale had been undermined from within. In many ways western culture has been undermined and is being corrupted from within. There is a great deal of evidence that good people act selflessly for the good of others. The overwhelming public response to the Tsunami disaster, brought to our attention by the right use of television, is a good example of this. However, there is strong evidence that all is not well in our society: the latest manifestation being so-called “binge drinking” among the young. We believe that the media, by what it normalises, has certainly not hindered the slide towards incivility and social fragmentation.
SM - Catholics Unplug your Televisions like Mediawatch and many other concerned groups regarding the TV took part in the X-Rated TV series on Channel 4 because we believed it was an opportunity for a genuine debate on standards of broadcast TV. Do you believe it was a fair and even debate?
JCB - The ‘X-Rated’ programme was a huge disappointment. We
were led to believe and promised that it would be a serious examination of the
issues that concern us and many other people. Instead, it turned out to be
another platform for television executives and presenters to justify everything
that they do strung together between a lot of pornographic and offensive clips
and repetitive obscene language. Concerned people were captioned simply as
“complainers” and their grievances were ridiculed. Of the hours of my
interviewing and consultation only about 20 seconds made it into the programme.
The mocking commentary throughout ridiculed everyone who was not employed in the
television industry. It was not a debate and certainly not even.
SM - In this
age of AIDS and the breakdown of the family do you believe that the media
especially the TV has contributed to these problems and you believe the media
are acting irresponsibly in this regard?
JCB - By portraying casual sexual relations and marital infidelity so frequently and by showing marriage as an unhappy, unglamorous and outdated “lifestyle option” I do believe that the media significantly contributes to social and moral fragmentation and the rise of behavioural problems. If the media promoted life-long marriage in film and drama instead and made it seem attractive and normal I feel sure that many of society’s ills would begin to be resolved. It is argued that television should not be involved in “social engineering” but the truth is that it does this by its nature. I recall that Sir Christopher Bland, a former Chairman of the BBC, said that the BBC “had helped to shape the taste of the nation”. Sir Terence Conran, founder of Habitat, said that “taste is shaped by what is available”. If one particular view of life dominates entertainment it is not surprising that other views are dismissed or have much less status no matter how valid or beneficial they may be.
SM - Do you believe a responsible media can inform educate and entertain without resorting to the more sensational and base elements?
JCB - Yes, I do believe that a responsible media can educate,
entertain and inform. The media, given the will, can contribute positively to
any society. If the will or commitment is absent this then becomes a legitimate
concern of regulators and governments. We have stated that there comes a point
when governments should intervene for the sake of the public good if
well-intentioned social policies and social cohesion are being undermined by
what the media portrays. So far this has fallen on deaf ears and eyes that are
blind and minds that are closed.
Finally, I would like to say to CUT
supporters that we can be stronger together in our opposition to that which is
offensive to Mankind and to Almighty God.
SM – We would like to thank John C Beyer for agreeing to do the
interview and our prayers are with him and Mediawatch-uk. Anyone interested in
joining Mediawatch-uk please contact:
John C Beyer
Director,
mediawatch-uk
3 Willow House
Kennington Road
Ashford
Kent
TN24
0NR
T - 01233 633936
F - 01233 633836
E - info@mediawatchuk.org
W - http://www.mediawatchuk.org/
The Nefarious Power of Television – TV in the
USA
by Christine Fitzgerald
Homosexuals and lesbians are regular fare today for TV viewers
• Rosie O'Donnell and Ellen De Generis – both openly professed lesbians.
• "Queer Eye for the Straight Guy" – homosexual content
displayed in a sympathetic context.
• NBC's popular ER in which Dr. Kerry Weaver (Laura Innes) has openly professed herself a lesbian. A character in the Buffy the Vampire Slayer is also openly lesbian.
• Joan of Arcadia – a teenager who converses with different human incarnations of "god," including a school cafeteria server, a street sweeper, and a "cute" teen-age boy. This "god" preaches the modern gospel of relativism: be true to yourself, whatever that may be… The blatant immorality is one thing. Another is the violence. One night of television watching can bring a hundred murders into view. How cruel and insensitive must a person become who, by gradualism, is hardened to murders committed before their eyes? How many persons are influenced by these criminal models? The answers to these questions can be readily reached on the five o'clock news every evening. Children are kidnapped, molested, tortured, and murdered; women are done in by their husbands and vice-versa; middle school children are killing their schoolmates; everywhere there is suicide, dishonesty in the work place, extra-marital affairs, and much more.
This is what American families are getting used to. Even though the television is not the only cause of these increasing crimes, doubtless it has a powerful influence. Watching TV everyday, saturated by the immorality and violence shown with impunity, Americans are becoming more corrupted and aggressive.
A Bad and Subtle Process that Unconsciously Changes our Customs
Along with the shocking violence and immorality, there is a subtle process taking place in the minds of viewers. Persons tend to think it's just entertainment; they don't realize that their whole ideology is being changed, subtly and quietly. The change is gradual, and affects them, their children, and all of society.
This process has been called unperceived ideological transhipment, large words that mean our minds are being changed without our noticing it. When Marlon Brando appeared on screen in the 1950s in a sleeveless undershirt, it shocked many. Today, no one would even blink twice because they have been gradually accustomed to much worse.
Doctors trained in hypnosis say that the flickering light of the television puts people into an imperceptible trance where images and ideas pass into their brains without the normal censure of reason. So images and ideas are introduced into one's mind by a stranger – and further, in a strange kind of way different from other types of learning.
This nefarious power of the television can explain part of the change that has occurred in our daily lives. Forty years ago, it was rare to hear of a murder, a kidnapping, or a child being molested in an unnatural way. At that time, people went to bed at night in most small towns with their doors unlocked. Christmas brought public displays everywhere of crèches and nativity scenes. In my home town, on Good Friday, all the merchants closed shop during the hours of 12 to 3 p.m. in respect for the time during which Our Lord was crucified. Children were respectful to their parents and adults in general, and they dressed like boys and girls. Tattoos and body piercing were rightfully relegated to pagan tribes and barbarians, not to persons in a civilized country.
In fact, no child would have been able to conjure up the atrocities in dress and personal "decoration" that we see today. Where did the inspiration for that come from? We are different, radically different as a society than we were 40 years ago. What brought us to this place, to this condition that we are all suffering in today?
One of the factors of this change certainly was the television. Revolutionary, pagan and esoteric ideas unacceptable to our Catholic mentality were implanted in our customs. Society was introduced to different ways of being, dressing, speaking and acting - vulgar, egalitarian, and immoral, and the viewers, without realizing it, without perceiving it, gradually accepted them and changed their own attitudes and values. The normal reaction of outrage, softened by repeated viewing and by seductive situations that glorified immoralities and unnatural behaviour, was dulled. This gradual process made things acceptable now that were unacceptable years ago.
A Simple and Wise Solution: Turn It Off
Is this a complex and complicated issue that will take years of
research to find how to stop it? No, the answer is simple
and
straightforward. As a nation, we Americans must turn off the television
set. By doing so, we will have cut some important lines of communication that
revolutionary, immoral and depraved people have to our homes and our children.
We need to block such access to our own souls and those for whom we have a
responsibility.
In days past, the Catholic Church taught us that we were morally responsible – culpable – for placing ourselves or our children in the near occasion of sin. Today's television programming is the occasion of sin, for sure, even in some cases the news programs with their "reporting" of every kind of atrocity and unnatural act.
The very idea of turning off the television causes fear and trembling in many parents. What can be done with our time? How will we be entertained? The children will never go for it. If one wants to speak of fear and trembling, he would be wise to review the words of St. Paul:
"With fear and trembling – work out your salvation …. that you may be blameless and sincere children of God, without reproof, in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation: among whom you shine as lights in the world." (Phil 2:12,16)
A solution for the family - Don't let it dominate family life. Turn it off.
Newsweek, November 11, 2002
People who truly care about "working out their salvation in fear and trembling" should ask themselves what would be the best use of their time. How long has it been since families played games together? What a wonderful way of connecting with your children! When our time at home is spent mute before the television, it is impossible to develop normal relationships that build respect, love, understanding and cooperation between children and parents. People who have thrown out the television have discovered, to their delight, that life becomes more interesting, children gradually become calmer and draw closer to the family. Innocence and peace slowly return to the home.
In years past individuals were happy and even proud of their
distinctions, their family traits and ways of being that made them
different
from others. Today, we have the mass man, who all look and act the same. The
modern teenager thinks what his friends think, wear what his friends wear. The
models for this dress and behaviour come from what is seen on television. The
point of reference is no longer the family. Friends – or even a group or gang –
have replaced the normal ties to home and family.
The models of the Catholic family and home not so long ago were Christ and the Blessed Mother and St. Joseph. Lives of the saints were held up to admire and imitate. Now we have Magic Johnson and Brittany Spears. One of the elements that has contributed to this downhill slide is the almost universal and deadly influence of television on society.
Fortunately, a landslide of books is also appearing that detail
the negative effects of television on every aspect of a person's
life,
particularly in a child's formation. If we are distressed by what we
see around us in society – and who isn't – the solution is easy. Turn off the
television once and for all.
To remember that we will be judged by what we willingly choose to put in our minds, be it innocent or vile, is to remember the counsel of Our Lord Himself speaking to the multitudes: "Blessed are the pure of heart for they shall see God"
Television kills, says German Professor
Kate Connolly of the Daily Telegraph reported that Television is responsible for the deaths of 20,000 Germans a year, according to Professor Manfred Spitzer, a neuroscientist at the University of Ulm for psychiatry.
Ms Connolly goes on to write that Professor Spitzer has found a
direct correlation between watching excessive amounts of television and death
caused by obesity, high blood pressure, high
cholesterol levels and
diabetes. He said: "People who watch too much have little time for sport or
movement of any kind. They eat more in turn and that leads to them becoming
overweight and dying earlier." This is the result of his studies of the habits
of 15,000 children carried out across the western world.
In his book
published 18/02/2005, “Beware of the TV Screen”, Prof Spitzer also quantifies
the damage television inflicts on the mind. "Children who watch TV have narrow
horizons," he said.
He told The Telegraph: "It reduces the plasticity of their brains which remain unstimulated and fail to develop properly. Later they smell and taste things differently because their senses are warped, and, as adults, go on to buy unhealthy foods, similar to those they have seen advertised on television."
Television in early childhood also often led to attention deficiency, violence and depression that affected children's performance in the classroom, he said.
CUT takes part in Channel 4 ‘debate’ on
controversial TV
In March of this year the British Co-ordinator of CUT took part in one of the programmes on Channel 4’s look at controversial television. Along with members of other organisations concerned with rapidly declining standards we agreed to do an interview. In our view this was one of the most puerile and evil programmes ever shown on TV. It was an excuse for the producers of these programmes to show all the really shocking bits again one after the other. It was also used as an opportunity to pigeonhole anyone who objected to this filth as a ‘COMPLAINER’.
We were led to believe that this was a serious investigation into TV standards and those concerned about them. The programme was called ‘Watershed,’ many of us spent hours being interviewed with assurances we would be treated fairly. However when the programme was broadcast we were subjected to prolonged filth, they even had a female narrator use filthily language to voice over some scenes.
This is an example of the power of the TV producers to do
almost whatever they like and to browbeat anyone who stands up to them. It is
the young that are most at risk, so it is not surprising that that schoolgirl
pregnancies are out of control, that HIV cases continue to rise and groups of
young school children beat up other young children in random ‘happy slapping’
incidents during which they record the event on a video phone and send it to
their class mates. It only reinforced the belief of CUT that the only way to
combat such evil is to unplug your TV for good and throw it out. Or detune all
secular channels and watch only family channels such as EWTN.
How about giving up the TV for Lent? You might never
want to turn it on again
TV over Christmas and into the New Year
To say all TV programmes are bad is not credible. However, it
is perhaps the few good programmes that act as bait to trap people into Telly
watching and even being TV’s apologists.
Nevertheless, we wish to give
credit where it is due and mention the good and a series on Christian history in
Wales, Bread of Heaven; which, against all recent BBC trends regarding Catholic
history was fair and balanced. However, before we can once again settle down in
front of the TV without fear of being attacked or shocked there were quite a few
programmes that were bad and one that was quite frankly ugly.
Channel Four’s Who wrote the Bible? was not only bad but
bad theology with a nice slice of anti-Catholicism thrown in for good measure.
At CUT we have heard various reports, one from a secular fundamentalist who said
that Luther was a hero; but on the whole Catholics thought it was amateurish and
flawed. If the argument for free speech is used to justify the showing of
programmes such Jerry Springer the Opera, how about the freedom to choose where
you spend your money? The Springer musical went ahead even after almost 50,000
requests to stop it or to remove the blasphemy. Sadly the answers to these pleas
were puerile and mechanical. The whole event was indeed very ugly. This sort of
blasphemy is surprising even now. However, they would never attempt to depict
Mohamed in the same way for like all bullies they are cowards at heart. We are
glad they do not attack other faiths the way they attack
Christianity.
‘…Our society, in spite of what it manifests, is in search of true
positive values lived by people who [are] convinced that they have really found
in Jesus Christ the hidden pearl. In this way, it is hoped that your initiative
might find may followers’.
Cardinal O’Brien wrote:
‘…I am indeed grateful for various initiatives which are
taking place to remind our people of the real meaning Christmas’.
More watches planned
More watches before the Blessed Sacrament instead of
watching the TV are pencilled in especially during Lent. We hope to continue
through the year. If you would like to arrange a watch BBS (Before the Blessed
Sacrament) instead of BBC please let us know and we will supply leaflets and try
and get a member of CUT to attend and help you out.
A letter from Cardinal López Trujillo PONTICICUM
CONSILIUM PRO FAMILIA
Dear Mr Mazzeo,
Thank you for your support for the efforts to make known the
fact that condoms will not prevent but rather spread the AIDS pandemic. If you
wish to see documents of the Pontifical Council for the Family, please visit our
internet website at http://www.pcf.va/ .I am
sure the information contained therein will help you in your apostolate. Please
rest assured of my prayers. With every best wish, I remain
Sincerely yours in
Christ
+ Alfonso Card. Lopez Trujillo
President.
CUT Comment – The media and the culture of death?
Cardinal Lopez Trujillo is a true hero of our time by bravely standing up to the media bullies and all those mislead by the secular fundamentalism. Surely, anyone can see that if you have AIDS or HIV you should not have sex at all? If you do even with a condom you are playing Russian Roulette with some else’s life. However, the media would like us to believe otherwise, so they attack the good Cardinal and Catholic teaching but in doing so are the media condoming people to death? (Please excuse the pun for we know it is very serious subject, but we believe it is the truth). Perhaps media secular fundamentalists in their heart of hearts know that they themselves are the real culprits. For the storylines in much modern drama have led people to accept casual sex, which of course is the real reason for the AIDS crisis. You cannot transmit AIDS by leading a Christian life and following Catholic teaching.
LIFE WITHOUT TELEVISION
The benefits of rearing a family without the TV
`My wife and I have not had a television in the house for the last fifteen years. Our oldest child is fourteen, so that means that all four of our children have grown up without television.
When I mention this to people, they express a variety of reactions, ranging from 'you must be nuts', through 'they're not really very expensive', to 'I wish I could…' A recent correspondent on an E-group wrote: "How do you do it? I would have withdrawal symptoms like Heroin withdrawals. What do you do with yourselves? (sic) I mean my goodness! I'm in shock!! ;) " (A good analogy for the TV – for people sit around it in a trance like state, Ed).
So I propose in this brief article to say a little about how we came to be such social oddities, the impact we believe it has on ourselves and others, and why acquiring a television would now seem like a very bizarre decision to us.
It all started when we moved house. Up till then we had hired a television, and watched the news, weather and current affairs, the occasional film, and so on. We also had a hired video recorder. When we came to move, we realized that we had recorded dozens of films over the last few years, many of them good, and yet never found the time to watch them. That led us to consider whether it was worth hiring either piece of kit in our new house. If we had such a backlog and had never found time to watch them, what was the point?
So we didn't bother, immediately after moving, just to see how we would get on without one. We have never looked back. I give that history to make it clear that we didn't give up TV because we were some kind of nutters. If anything, we have become more nutty since - if it is nutty to start to question the value of the television and the culture it helps to promote and perpetuate.
Our four children are not the social pariahs everyone warned us they would be if denied this most fundamental human right. On the contrary, because they have learned from an early age to entertain themselves and play with each other, to read books and create imaginary worlds, and so on, they are very popular with their peers. They make good playfellows and intelligent conversationalists. Friend’s love coming to our house because there is always something going on: dressing up and producing a show, making music, playing a game…
We do not restrict them from TV altogether - they watch at their gran's and at friends' houses. Moreover, we get DVDs of films that they will enjoy from the library and play them on the computer.
As for how we fill our time, I find there are never enough
hours in the day anyway - how people would fit in watching TV is a total mystery
to me (especially when I consider the number who tell me they can't find the
time for prayer or even exercise…) It's certainly true that we miss some aspects
of TV - my wife loves films and I would like to watch sport, but the perspective
of fifteen years without a TV makes me convinced that we are better off without
one.
For example: we are not de-sensitised by the relentless barrage of
high-impact visual images that TV thrives on - for example, our kids go to a
film at the cinema and laugh or cry or shriek, while most other kids sit there
looking comatose. We are not playing host to other peoples' values or need to
'push back the boundaries.' We sit down to meals together and talk to each
other. We help each other with homework and chores. We play together. We make
music together. We pray together.
If you ask our kids whether they'd like to have a TV, you'd get a split vote. The younger two would say yes, the older two no. I'm guessing that the younger two will decide we are right, too, as they mature a bit.
Above all, my wife and I are striving to bring our children up to dare to be different from the culture in which we live. We try to do that by making their lives more fun, more stimulating and more challenging than their friends'. And having no television is a fantastic starting point for that project.'
By Mr Andrew Plasom-Stuart.
Thousands switch off as BBC viewers fall to an
all-time low
By Nicol Lampert Daily Mail 15-12-04 (excerpt)
Viewing figures for BBC’s two main channels fell to their
lowest for levels in television history. Yearly figures from January 1 to
December 9 show BBC1’s share of all viewers falling by 3.5 percent to 24.6 per
cent, the first time it has dropped below the 25 percent barrier seen as vital
in the industry. BBC2’s share fell almost 9 percent to 9.9 percent.
Channel 4 plan week of programmes on
censorship.
Channel Four plan week of programmes regarding censorship
It
has been reported that Channel Four plan a week in March of programmes regarding
censorship. We do not recommend that people watch them. We are suspicious that
it may be just an excuse to show excerpts from films and programmes that should
have been banned. We have given interviews stating that we believe that they are
going to far. So Catholics Unplug you Televisions.
Stop porn getting on the TV screen
Office of Communications: contact@ofcom.org.uk or telephone 0845 456 3000. and:-
Channel 4, 124 Horseferry Road, London, SW1P 2TX
Tel: 0207 306
8333
and throw the TV out!
Contrary to popular practice, Advent is not a time for materialism and excess. Advent should be a time of quiet reflection and preparation for feast of the incarnation of God.
However, in a recent study of the TV advertising industry it was discovered that the advertisers employ researchers to study the effects of brand advertising on Children. The brief for these researchers is to perfect the advertisements directed at children so it increased their ‘pester power’. At a time of rising family debt and with Christmas becoming ever more expensive, is this an ethical way of targeting the family through provoking covetousness in children?
The Holy Father has stressed that the next twelve months should be a special time of adoration before the Blessed Sacrament. So we suggest it would be appropriate to spend time in adoration of the Blessed Sacrament instead of watching the TV and we are trying to co-ordinate a national watch on the 18th of December.
When others are getting drunk at office parties or vegetating in front of the TV, why not take the family to Church and watch for an hour, or say the rosary or other family prayers. See your priest and perhaps he will organise it. Hopefully, next year will become a special time of Eucharistic Adoration as requested by the Pope. At the end of this newsletter is a leaflet for you to fill in the times of the watch and put it up in your Church or better still hand it out after Mass. Just ask your priest first.
BLASPHEMY ON TV
One the shocking aspects of modern film and TV is the bad language and by far the worse aspect of this is blasphemy, the deliberate using of the Holy Name Jesus and or Christ as a swear word. Quite often this is done while using other expletives as well. This is a direct violation of the second commandment. ‘You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain.’ (Exodus 20:7)
In a survey by Mediawatch-uk called the `Grunt Report' it showed that the total incidents of blasphemy was 549 in films shown on British TV in 2003. The BBC were among the worst offenders, in fact one of the films they broadcast:- `North Dallas Forty,' had 18 incidents of blasphemy.
Some people say that we do not live in the real world if we expect no swearing or blasphemy. Is reality on the blink here? Christians do not normally live in a world of swearing and blasphemy and we do not want to hear it in our front rooms. We certainly do not want to pay for the broadcasting of such blasphemy either. For further information visit the Mediawatch-uk website: http://www.mediawatchuk.org/
More BBC bias against Catholics and our Church
Two more programmes on BBC Radio 4 have been broadcast, in which the corporation shows its anti-Catholic colours. In one programme, `The Long View' they liken St Edmund Campion to Abu Hamza the radical Muslim cleric who is accused of inciting terrorism. Campion was a devout priest who administerd to the beleaguered and oppressed Catholic population in Elizabethan England. For this he was hung drawn quartered at Tyburn in 1581. Are truth and reality once again on the blink at the BBC?
In another programme on Radio 4, the BBC purported to
present a balanced presentation of Catholics and their views on the Church
today. However, was this a true representation of ordinary Catholics or a chance
for dissidents and extremists to vent spleen? Many have told CUT that they do
not recognise these views in the majority of Catholics that they know. There
were two brief interviews from those who portrayed the Church in a good light.
However, the other 95% of the programme was given over to the usual feminists
and disgruntled ex -sisters and ex- priests; it is our experience that the
proportions are the other way around. We love our Church and her teachings and
we must pray for the BBC and its people, for to persecute the Church is a
terrible thing and they will one day meet Jesus and answer for their actions.
Remember paying the TV licence funds BBC radio as well.
2% of British homes no longer have a
TV
So they put up the licence fee!
The BBC admit that 2% of British homes no longer have a TV. We can assure them that this figure is growing rapidly especially among Catholics, for we are tired of funding attacks on our Church. No wonder they have had to put the licence fee up again; yet another £5.50, which brings it to £126.50 and they intend to put it up again over the inflation rate next year.
WE SUGGEST GIVING LICENCE FEE TO CHARITY
CUT suggests that anyone who turns off the TV for good might like to redirect the licence fee where it can do some good. How about giving £10 per month to a Catholic charity. CUT will suggest some charities every Issue:
The Cardinal Winning’s Pro-Life Initiative, 104 Albert Road, Crosshill,
Glasgow G42 8DR.
or
Mill Hill Missionaries
St Peter’s House, College
Avenue, Freshfield, Formby, Liverpool L37 1LE.
or
Comboni
Missionaries
Brownberrie Lane, Horsforth, Leeds, LS18 5HE.
Use this text for your leaflet:
On the ……… December 2004
The Holy Father has asked that, this next year should be a special time of adoration before the Blessed Sacrament. We would like to suggest that Catholics make a special effort to watch before the Blessed Sacrament and perhaps do this on a regular basis instead of watching the TV.
In accordance with the Holy Father's wishes CUT are encouraging a
The
television - a spiritual health warning
The dictatorship of relativism and Ten anti-Commandments
of the TV
1) The TV puts false gods before the Lord God
The gods of all faiths are equal, that materialism, self-centredness, and
all morals are relative, are put before the Gospel of Jesus.
2) The TV and Blasphemy
Not only taking of the Lord’s name in vain but at the BBC’s
“Impartiality seminar,” staff confirmed they would allow the
Bible to be sacrilegiously treated, but not the Koran.
3) The TV and the desecration of the Lord’s Day
Sunday’s TV is like any other day containing programmes of sex and
violence. No longer a day of rest and worship of God. Sunday TV is for the
worship of sport and materialism.
4) The TV and the destruction of the family.
How can children honour their mother and their father when the TV constantly
denigrates family values, and shows fornication, and same-sex marriage in
a positive light?
5) The TV and the trivialisation of killing
Empirical studies have shown, TV violence leads to violence and killings.
Stabbings and shootings are now all too common on our streets with the constant
lowering of TV standards.
6) The TV, the promoter of adultery
Our Lady of Fatima said to the visionaries that more souls go to hell because
of sins against purity than any other sin. On the TV the promotion of impurity
and adultery are writ large.
7) The TV and the theft of souls
Satin is the thief of souls. St. Elizabeth Seton (c1800s) had a vision she
did not understand. She saw a black box in every American home, through
which the devil would enter.
8) The TV, the false witness
Every year more programmes are made that bare false witness against the
Church.
9) The TV, the author of sexual covetousness
Jesus said: “If your right eye causes you to sin pluck it out and
throw it away; it is better that you lose one of your members than that
your whole body be thrown into hell” (Matt 5:29).
10) The TV as the author material covetousness
Advertising promotes materialism and things you don’t need or really
want. Pester power turns children into the allies of the advertising executives
and the enemy of poor parents.
Towards a Dictatorship of Relativism
By Stefano Mazzeo
During his homily for the Mass of the Conclave the then Cardinal Ratzinger
said, “We are moving toward a dictatorship of relativism which does
not recognize anything as for certain and which has as its highest goal
one’s own ego and one’s own desires.”1 I have been intrigued
by these words ever since and in this article here I wish to explore relativism
and its dictator.
I sometimes get invited to give talks to church groups or a priest might
ask me to say a few words after Mass. On one occasion I was going through
my three minute slot after Mass when I heard grumbling coming from the back
of the church. Afterwards, a man came up to me and said I was being dictatorial.
So I answered him that surely he can’t begrudge me three minutes to
point out the dangers of the TV when he will spend at least four hours in
front of the box today. If he believes in free speech he will listen to
the other side of the argument but no, this citizen of the ‘Republic
of Relativism’ continued to disrupt my giving out of newsletters and
leaflets. I concluded later that this was a victim of the Dictatorship of
Relativism. He would not listen because he believed in free speech!
What does the Holy Father mean when he warns us about Relativism or more
precisely the Dictatorship of Relativism. Relativism is the belief that
everything is equal; all faiths are the same and so are morals, especially
sexual morals and are relative to the desires of the self. There is no truth,
one man’s truth is as good and the next, e.g. homosexuality is the
equal of heterosexuality and they have the right to have children even though
they can’t. So the government enacts legislation that crushes natural
law, legalises ‘Civil Partnerships’ and gives homosexuals the
right to adopt children. No agency may refuse them on the grounds of religious
beliefs. Even in this the government are not the real dictators of relativism,
they are merely the lackeys of the Dictator. This Dictator tells us that
all morals are relative except murder, unless of course they are weak and
old, or very ill then they should be treated with dignity – and killed!
The dictators of relativism will go into long discourses and seek out all
views, for all views are equal. After all what is truth as Pilot said to
Jesus. Theft is still wrong unless it is your faith or your soul. Blasphemy,
materialism fornication, adultery, violence, and family values are all relative.
It is only children that really suffer and children should be seen and not
heard. Unless of course they are unborn, therefore they are neither seen
or heard for out of sight is out of mind. The dictator of relativism is
pro-choice, for choice is a good thing. Unless of course you are a child
in your mother’s womb then you have no voice or choice.
We are told all religions are ultimately the same and even Paganism is equal
to Christianity in terms of being efficacious of spiritual awareness. That
we are all on different roads but travelling to the same place. This may
sound good and charitable, even to some Catholics but it is wrong and not
what our faith teaches us. I am not saying that there are not some truly
wonderfully good people in other faiths. We believe know that a good person
who is invincibility ignorant of Jesus may be saved. However, it is true
charity and the duty of all Christians is to share the Good News of Jesus
with all mankind. For ‘Christ is the only Son of God…and that
the man Jesus is eternally God, is God Himself’2 However the dictator
of relativism would rather we believed that - ‘Instead of being the
man who is God, Christ becomes the one who experienced God in a special
way.’3
Jesus is no different to any other religious leader, therefore all religions
are the same and as they all say different things perhaps ultimately none
can be true. So God is either very vague or dose not exist– just what
Satan wants us to think.
The Hypnotic effect of the television
The real dictator of relativism is of course the Devil, the great deceiver,
and the giver of the knowledge of good and evil, but not the wisdom to know
the difference. There are many weapons, which the dictator of relativism
will use to attack us. The vast array of media genre with secular intellectuals
who tell us to have an open mind and governments that legislate and enact
laws to follow their lead. But of all the weapons in the Dictator of Relativism’s
arsenal the television is most effective. The television is not only mildly
hypnotic, it also desensitises the reasoning logical side of the brain and
plays on the emotional side. The accumulative effect of this is devastating
and it is difficult to see what’s happening but its ill effects are
all around us. The TV is in virtually every person’s home and watched
by almost everyone. Many dramas and documentaries that play on our emotions
have a relativistic agenda and will try and discredit the Churches teachings
on faith and morals. Against these attacks the Church is given very little
chance to answer and when she does all the tricks of the book is deployed
against her. It is this hypnotic quality that is the Dictator of Relativism’s
most dangerous weapon. Against its onslaught there is not much most people
can do for they are unaware there is a problem. The television acts on humanity
like an anti-spiritual neutron bomb; it leaves the body intact (superficially)
but destroys the soul.
The television can be very subtle, it is sometimes difficult to distinguish
good and bad television programmes for they are all treated equally, given
the same amount of time and demand the same attention. Most of the classics
may be harmless e.g. Austin and Dickens, however there are programmes of
a similar genre that not so harmless.
The disastrous effect the TV has had on the last few countries to receive
it are well known by scientists who study the TV4. For the introduction
of television has always coincided with a dramatic increase in violence,
theft, murder, and rape. The corrosive effect on people by television is
well documented but not well publicised, for the broadcasters control what
we see what we hear and even what we think.
There are thousands of TV channels broadcasting seven days a week, twenty-four
hours a day. Cultural and moral vandalism is endemic. The Virginia University
killer sent a tape of himself to NBC TV between his massacres, which to
much dismay was broadcast.
Only people with a strong faith can see the wrong in it all for they have
a measure from which to see. They know that to be intrigued by the backbiting,
gossipy, angry storylines of soaps is incompatible with the Gospel. They
know the truth when the Church is attacked, and they can see the agenda.
They can see through the biased, relativistic documentaries. They question
everything using their faith and the Gospel of Jesus as a guide. These people
will eventually throw out the TV, if they haven’t already done so.
References:
1.(Benedict XVI), homely 18th April 2005
2 & 3. Introduction to Christianity (Benedict XVI) p.21 2004
4. Dr Aric Sigman, Remotely Controlled, Vermilion, 2005
RTE’s Middle Class, Elitist Ghetto of Dublin 4
By Dominic Casey in Dublin
You could write a book or even volumes on the effect the television has had on the Irish People. The main Irish broadcasting network RTE is situated in Donnybrook, Dublin 4. It is a well to do area. There is now a term ‘The Dublin 4 set’ and ‘the Dublin 4 mentality’. Dublin 4 meaning RTE. The ‘Dublin 4 set’ would consist of high earners and the upper middle class. They would be out of university. They would be of a liberal mindset and all that would suggest. Anti-Catholic or at least indifferent to church issues, especially on morality. This would be the type that would hold sway in RTE. So this is the message that would be continuously transmitted from there. No doubt there are good church abiding people working at RTE but they would be the minority and in less influential positions. Dònnacha O’Dualing of Fàifteisteach fame would probably be of this latter type.
However, we may be witnessing the destruction of Irish Culture itself. Ireland was once known as the most Catholic country in Europe and Celtic Catholicism had its own particular ethnicity that permeated every strand of Irish society. The media has been to the fore in Church bashing regarding the scandals. That the abuses have been highlighted and brought out into the open is not such a bad thing. But the media and RTE in particular threw out the baby with the bath water. When the scandals broke there was a decrease in church attendance. And everything about the Church was painted black. In doing this they are destroying the soul of Irish culture. Dublin is now indistinguishable from any big ‘British city’ with loud ruckus behaviour and bad manners. Where once they was a gentle sparkle in the eyes of young Irish children raised on the Sacraments and the Rosary there is now only the dull blankness archived by hours of daily TV and computer viewing.
People tune into the popular chat shows for their daily diet
of gossip and opinion. Foremost among them would be ‘The Late Late
Show’ on Friday night with Pat Kenny and his daily radio show on RTE
1. There is the Gerry Ryan show on Radio RTE 2. Ryan is unashamedly liberal
who enjoys constantly having a swipe at the Church. The nature and content
of his show is very dissolute and he enjoys a wide listenership. This obviously
all impacts on society.
In the case of the television (as has been pointed out in CUT’s Autumn
06 issue), it desensitises the beta waves of the left hemisphere of the
brain, which would deal with information logically. This inevitably makes
the person a prey to the standards that are presented to him.
RTE has constantly come under criticism for its biased and unfair handling of moral issues in its current affairs programmes. I would say Ireland would be not much different than Britain in how it has been affected by television. In the past twenty years church attendances has dropped by a good bit. Divorce has been introduced. Marriage break-ups are up. Co-habitation is the norm, teenage pregnancies are up, Condom sales have been introduced and there has been the inevitable increase in S.T.D.S. Has the television influenced Irish society?u decide.
Irish TV Protest
Recently a dissatisfied customer decided to register his complaint to R.T.E. He drove his car through the front barriers. Drove through the front door of the building, while the Late Late Show was going on. - That’s complaining Irish style!
Homosexuality and the Television
By Stefano Mazzeo
It is an act of Christian charity to point out when someone is going astray.
This is not being judgemental, for not to do so would be negligent. On the
basis of Sacred Scripture and the Catechism of the Catholic Church, homosexual
acts are a grave sin. We must therefore point out the link between the acceptance
of homosexuality by society, and the television. For within ten years of
the television coming into widespread use in Britain, homosexuality was
legalised. Since then there has been the constant lowering of the age of
homosexual consent until parity with heterosexual consent was achieved.
Now legalised homosexual partnerships have the right to adopt children.
Just when ordinary Christians thought things couldn’t get any worse,
the government brings fourth draconian legislation that will force Catholic
adoption agencies to close down or let homosexuals adopt from them.
It is not surprising that this has happened with the sheer number of pro-homosexual
television programmes broadcast down the years. Today we have openly homosexual
television presenters, commentators, and actors. Makeover programmes show
homosexual couples choosing the décor for their pads. There are also
the constant pro-homosexual story lines in the soaps and other dramas. This
trait has even spilled over onto BBC Radio with the ‘Gay-marriage’
in the Archers. Also prevalent in these programmes are storylines that demonise
anyone who are portrayed as ‘anti-gay,’ these people are usually
shown as nasty, brutish and violent. Words like ‘bigoted’, ‘gay-bashing’,
or ‘homophobic’ are used to put down anyone who dares speak
up against homosexual acts.
It is also very clear that the BBC is especially ‘pro-Gay’ with
a disproportionate number of homosexuals on its staff. They are particularly
over represented among those in influential positions. There are many who
believe that this is the main reason why the BBC attacks Catholicism so
often. Why you may ask have so many homosexuals risen so high in the world
of television? There are many reasons; in order to keep people’s attention,
new and inventive storylines for showing relationships are constantly found.
The homosexual lifestyle is not a stay-at-home family orientated one; therefore
the hedonistic showbiz one suits them. Perhaps also in this contraceptive
‘Culture of Death’ society, there is the false perception that
humans have over populated the world. There is also the false theory that
humans have no control over their sexual desires, so homosexuality is a
useful form of sterility. It is true that the television is no friend of
chastity and has sexualised society beyond what is natural. Some like to
cite the television series Sex in the City as authentically portraying modern
female sexuality, yet they are wrong, for although originally created by
a woman, homosexual men produced this series. The creator and producer of
Desperate Housewives is also homosexual. An unnaturally over sexualised
society plays into the hands of homosexual lobby whose raison d’être
is unnatural sex. Yet despite all their efforts, homosexuality has not been
found to be a cognitive, it is achieved through conditioning.
There is also the homosexual phenomenon of “Boy Love” as they
like to call it (give me strength, Lord). There are a disproportionately
high number of paedophiles amongst the male ‘Gay’ population.
Researcher Dr Judith Reisman has stated that fewer than 2% of the male population
are homosexual, yet they account for roughly half of all paedophiles cases.
(See www.drjudithreismen.org for a fuller explanation). Yet the BBC will
scour the earth for paedophile priests but will not do a documentary on
“Boy Love” or the high proportion of ‘Gay’ paedophiles.
Is this a case of the pro-homosexual media taking the speck out of other
people’s eyes, yet forgetting the plank in their own?
News Cuttings
BBC anger at £2bn licence fee
shortfall Daily Telegraph 19/1/07.
The BBC warned last night that it faced a £2 billion funding shortfall
after the Government rejected calls for an above-inflation rise in the licence
fee. CUT comment – lucky for the BBC that they’re not a private
company.
‘Rome’ back with even more blood Sunday
Telegraph 7/1/07.
A corpse being given breast milk from a nursing mother, a blood-soaked soldier
carrying a head through the streets and a slave being tortured to death
– these are the scenes that await viewers of the new series Rome,
the BBC’s controversial hit drama. CUT – Should this kind of
violent trash be ‘free’ to air?
Grubby EastEnders Daily Mail 4/1/07.
How sad and grubby were the episodes of EastEnders shown on TV over Christmas.
I watched them because I wanted to see the final episodes starring Pauline
(Wendy Richard). But the storyline about a young girl seducing an older
man was horrible. CUT – Christmas at the BBC in the 21st century,
sad and grubby.
Beeb takes artistic licence to get on down dirty Sunday
Times 5/1/07.
The new licence fee is announced this week, so the BBC can finally breathe
a sigh of relief and unleash its worst upon us. And the first big news is
that BBC3 has commissioned a documentary about what modesty commands me
to refer as the ladies’ front bottom. Called The History of the C-word,
it will be at least an hour long and will take its place in the television
canon alongside Channel 4’s W**k Week (probably sniggering as it does
so). It’s barely a year since Germaine Greer gave viewers of BBC2’s
Balderdash and Piffle an illuminating lecture on the origins of the word.
Have these people no mercy? CUT - nope
Is it time to scrap the TV licence? The Economist
6/1/07
Debate has raged for years over whether the BBC should still be publicly
financed, and specifically by a licence fee that is by all those with television
sets. Many households, after all, now watch and listen to little of its
output but almost all pay £131.50 a year for it. CUT - IT IS time
to scrap the TV licence.
Yes, we are biased on religion and politics admit BBC executives Daily Mail 23/10/06 CUT – A leak from the BBC’s own Politburo
Last week’s vote results: Sunday Express
10/12/06
We asked for your views on falling standards of today’s television
programmes:
Is today’s TV just a load of rubbish?
YES: 99% NO: 1%
CUT – So 99% of TV viewers admit they spent their time watching rubbish.
Dose this sounds like drug addiction or hypnotism?
C4 ‘delight’ over Big Brother
Daily Mail 23/1/07
Channel 4 chiefs congratulated themselves yesterday on the bumper rating
of Celebrity Big Brother. They met to discuss the controversy over the allegedly
racist bullying of Bollywood star Shilpa Shetty by other contestants including
Jade Goody. CUT - After racist bullying and media hype C4 ratings sore.
Sounds like mob rule via the TV.
Does Davina go too far in sex education show?
Daily Mail 8/3/07
In [Channel 4’s] Let’s Talk sex, Miss McCall accompanies four
teenagers and two school heads to a Dutch youth centre. The group sits in
on sex education lessons in which children as young as four are taught about
homosexuality and shown cartoons of various sex acts. At one point in the
show, Miss McCall, a mother of three, unrolls a condom over a prosthetic
sex aid in front of two schoolchildren. CUT – If that exasperates
you, read this:
Don’t switch off Channel Phwoar- Its no good
harruphing about too much sex on the box – the world has moved on.
By Magnus Linklater The Times 15/11/06
I completely agree with Sir Jeremy Issacs that Channel 4 is obsessed with
sex. I am less certain that this is a bad thing. Most of us, I fear –
even Sir Jeremy perhaps – take a keen interest in the subject; at
what point this shades into an unhealthy interest is hard to define.
CUT – with words like Phwoar and harruphing looks like The Times has
moved on as well. However perhaps Mr Linklater should read the following.
Children film sex on their mobiles Sunday
Times 4/2/07
Children are using mobiles phones to film each other having sex and are
then sending the images to classmates. CUT – Where will these children
use the skills they’ve acquired, Channel 4?
Young pupils abuse teachers with sexual swear words
The Times 24/11/06
Children as young as 5 are consistently swearing at teachers with nearly
20 per cent of primary school teachers claiming to have been subject to
sexually abusive insults from pupils. In a study commissioned by National
Union of Teachers, England’s largest teaching union, researchers also
found that 75 per cent of secondary school teachers said that pupils used
language such as “F*** you” or “I’ve F***** your
mum” to one another. CUT – We get tied of people saying, ‘I
blame the parents’ when its really the TV’s fault – but
then the parents do let children watch the TV.
Thursday’s TV Choice The Times 03-07
The blackest of comedies involving incest, deviant priests and necrophilia
in a nursing home! CUT – This is bad even by channel 4’s standards,
this new ‘comedy’ has been reported to evolve child abuse, suicide,
drug addiction, priest spanking and even a dog that rapes a man. This might
be the Times’ TV Choice but we say its more discussing filth by a
channel that seems to be possessed by evil.
Schoolchildren of 11 get sex counsellors Daily
Mail 25/10/06
CUT – No Comment
The Holy Father’s Message for the World Day of Social Communications
“The complex challenges facing education today are often linked to
the pervasive influence of the media in our world… Indeed, some claim
that the formative influence of the media rivals that of the school, the
Church, and maybe even the home. Reality, for many, is what the media recognize
as real.
So often freedom is presented as a relentless search for pleasure or new
experience. Any trend to produce programs and products – including
animated films and video games – which in the name of entertainment
exalt violence and portray anti-social behaviour or the trivialization of
human sexuality is a perversion, all the more repulsive when these programs
are directed at children and adolescents.
BBC executives admit they are anti-Christian
From Edward Botterell
Late last autumn BBC executives admitted what critics have known for years,
that the corporation is institutionally biased. The revelation came from
leaked details of an ‘impartiality’ summit called by its then
chairman, Michael Grade. Senior figures admitted that the BBC is guilty
of promoting Left-wing views and anti-Christian sentiment. It was also suggested
that the BBC is guilty of political correctness and was disproportionately
over-represented by homosexuals. One senior BBC executive admitted that
the summit had opened peoples’ eyes to how biased the BBC had become.
‘Unfortunately, much of it is so deeply embedded in the BBC’s
culture, that it’s very hard to change it.’ Jesus said: He who
is not with me is against me, and he who does not gather with me scatters.’
St Luke (11:23).
CUT’s RECOMMENDED READ
THIS TIME IT’S A MAGAZINE
Inside the Vatican,
This magazine keeps you abreast of what’s happening in Rome, see what
the Holy Fathers saying and doing – he’s a very busy man.
For details write to:
Inside The Vatican,
P.O. Box No 42, Horsforth, Leeds, LS18 4UH, England
Or USA
Inside the Vatican, New Hope, KY 40052 USA
Editorial Office
Inside the Vatican, Via Delle Mura Aurelie 7c, Rome 00165, Italy
We support EWTN
At CUT we believe the television is fundamentally flawed and we will try
and persuade people to give it up. However, we also support EWTN for we
are realistic enough to realise we cannot get rid of the television completely.
The gospel of Jesus should be proclaimed and his Church should be represented,
wherever there are souls to be saved.
Notice board:
Many thanks to all who contributed to this newsletter, whether by articles, information, suggestions, research, letters of support and prayers. Thanks also for the generous response to our call for funds, to cover our print run and postage costs have doubled in the last year.
Request for information:
We have been recommended two books by our members that may be out of print:
The Mask of Hate by David Holbrok, and Set Free Childhood by Martin Lurge
– Can anyone help?
CUT suggests we give the licence fee to charity where it can
do some good. Here are some suggestions:
Peters Pence – His Holiness Pope Benedict XVI
0120 Vatican City State, Europe.
Or SPUC 5/6 Matthew Street, FREEPOST SW620, Westminster,
London, SW1 2BR.
Or Aid to the Church in Need 1 Times Square, Sutton, Surrey
SM1 1LL.
Or EWTN Britain: St Clare Media (EWTN) Ltd. (Charity No
1080782) PO Box 913, Enfield EN2 0WY
Or EWTN Ireland: St Brigid Media Ltd. (Charity No 15025)
PO Box 352, Limerick, 061 394400
Contact us at:
C U T
(Catholics Unplug your Televisions)
Waun Llydan, St David’s Well
Llananno,
Powys, LD1 6YP
Help us be effective in the fight against the secular fundamentalist’s
most deadly weapon the television, please send donations to the above address
with cheques made out to CUT or Catholics Unplug your Televisions.
Most important of all please remember us in your prayers.
watch in front of the Blessed Sacrament so join with us nationally on the 18th of December or when it’s convenient for your parish. Christmas is becoming so secularised, even renamed Winterfest in some places. This time of year has become so dark in many ways, a time of rampant materialism when advertisers target Children to exert ‘pester power’ on their parents to buy them the latest toy or computer game. People spend a fortune and in Britain, much of it will be on the Credit Card. People drink too much at the office party and make fools of themselves then stagger into their cars, no wonder this time of the year has the highest deaths from drink driving. What better time to go into your Church and spend an hour or three in front of the Blessed Sacrament and prepare for the wonderful time of Christmas.
Therefore, we would like to say:
and
“An hour in front of the Blessed Sacrament will do you far more good that a whole year in front of even the very best of television, let alone the things usually shown”
© CUT 2004 All Rights Reserved
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