For centuries, and especially before the Second Vatican Council, American Catholics were most easily defined by their separation from mainstream society. Whether distinguished by ethnic makeup, adherence to eccentric social customs, or as a result of exclusion due to widespread proliferation of anti-Catholic legislation, Catholic populations throughout every era and region of the United States have sought to create and sustain some manner of separate and exclusive institutions.
While diocesan newspapers and magazines have always been and continue to serve as important platforms for disseminating information among Catholic populations, other Catholic publications have long sought to act as journalistic entities that can report on a national scale, as well as issues on the forefront of the intersection of religion and public life.
Covering only a limited subset of subject matter within an endless world of print, digital, and other media, and targeting a specific subset of American Catholic readers, it should come as no surprise that Catholic media occasionally displays a validity that rivals, or even exceeds, the mainstream news industry. The Catholic media landscape has always shaped and re-shaped itself in relation to contemporary events in the Faith and generational shifts across the religious demographic, like partisan or ideological identifications. But in an age of massive upheaval in traditional news platforms and distribution, as legacy news outlets across the country see their revenues floundering, publishers are compelled chose only selective days to issue in print, and many local newsrooms are shuttered, if not reduced to a skeleton of their former selves, Catholic news sources must also grapple with the challenges facing the contemporary media industry as a whole.
Amid the collapse of news consumption as experienced by past generations, there are several notable innovations, both in content and in distribution, that Catholic news outlets are pursuing in an attempt to differentiate themselves from the pack. One hears the bywords of media movers and shakers, initiatives like ‘digital-first’ strategies and ‘subscription-based models,’ less in reference to the Catholic media landscape than, say, the New York Times or Wall Street Journal, outlets that have experienced unprecedented success due to their orientation towards a national subscription base and limiting user access free content through paywalls. However, that is not to say that the winds of change have not yet affected Catholic media. And while diocesan newspapers, too, are experiencing an era of upheaval (their potentially widespread trend towards shifting to magazine formats––a fascinating development), the innovations listed here are in reference to nationally-focused publications.
While statistics for newspaper circulation and subscriptions are helpful for determining the health and trajectory of a news publication, such easy measures are hard to come by. There are indications of success for some outlets, such as the massive leap in circulation reported by the National Catholic Register in the years immediately following its inclusion under the supervision of the Eternal World Television Network (EWTN) ‘family,’ likely stirred by its new access to national audiences.
Expansion in a Catholic media environment with a wealth of different options, however, is not easily attainable. In March of 2020, the Catholic Herald magazine shuttered its U.S. headquarters less than two years after opening their U.S. bureau, expanding their coverage to America with great fanfare. The Herald, a British publication known for its opinionated and “orthodox” viewpoints, experienced difficulty finding a path towards profitability, a controversy surrounding its publishing of an article deemed by many to be anti-Semitic, and the departure of the publication’s editor-in-chief. Much of the market saturation in the field of conservative-bent Catholic media they faced is due to the online expansion of outlets like Lifesite, a platform for pro-life news, founded by a Canadian political organization, that has been expanding its coverage to encompass news of the Church more broadly. The site operates using many similar approaches as websites like Buzzfeed and Huffpost, optimizing headlines for attracting as many clicks as possible, while acting essentially as a news aggregator.
America Magazine, the mouthpiece of the Jesuit order, found in physical form on every Jesuit college campus, including Boston College’s, has also experienced significant changes in adaptation to a digital-first landscape, directed under its editor-in-chief, Fr. Matt Malone, S.J. In addition to hosting more contributions from Jesuits across the country and founding The Jesuit Post, an offshoot publication featuring content from Jesuits in training, hired a full-time Vatican correspondent in 2014, as well as other lay news staffers, in order to increase their news coverage.
In an effort to distinguish their coverage from that of their competitors, the National Catholic Reporter (NCR) announced in 2019 the launch of a new content “portal” covering “stories of climate crisis, faith and action” dubbed “Earthbeat.” John L. Allen Jr., the former Vatican columnist for NCR as well as the Boston Globe, left to form an independent publication, Crux, with which the Globe cut ties only two years after its founding in 2014. Allen’s publication represents a dynamic experiment in the American Catholic media market, approaching its reporting from an entirely non-ideological, objective standpoint, while also maintaining “independence and critical distance,” as stated by its founder. Crux’s peculiar corporate structure as an employee-owned newspaper, a result of its release from the Globe’s balance sheet, is not entirely self-sustaining, however. The publication maintains a partnership with the Knights of Columbus, collects some ad revenue, and solicits charitable contributions in order to stay fully-staffed.
Such a precarious existence has become routine across the news industry, as consolidated corporations strip-down newsrooms to their bare essentials, independently-owned publications struggle to find profitability on their own, and many turn towards non-profit organizations as the only hope for continued news reporting. The recent trends of innovation in Catholic media demonstrate the extent to which Catholic outlets must adapt to the same changing technological platforms and revenue structures as mainstream media sources. For some publications, this transition is a matter of life and death; a failure to adjust to these sometimes harsh realities might, for some Catholic outlets, result in irrelevance, and ultimately dissolution.
Featured image courtesy of University Communications
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