The Pope, the Council and the Media

Full circle

A follow-up to a couple posts down. Here's an excerpt from a well-written piece appearing in the Telegraph:

Pope Benedict XVI: media led the Church into profanity 

The Pope has launched a stinging attack against the media, saying that it had led the Church into "profanity" by spreading a message that Catholicism had to modernise and become more inclusive. 

Just two weeks before he steps down as pontiff, Benedict XVI told a group of priests in the Vatican that as a result, some church services had become little more than community meetings. 

The 85-year-old Pope blamed the media for twisting and misrepresenting the reforms of the Second Vatican Council in the 1960s, presenting them as the beginning of a transfer of power from the Vatican to individual bishops and their congregations. 

"The media saw the council as a political struggle, a struggle for power between different currents within the Church. It was obvious that the media would take the side of whatever faction best suited their world," he said. 

As a result, some churches had perhaps misunderstood the intent of the Second Vatican Council, losing their focus on the liturgy "as an act of faith" and instead trying to make it "understandable, similar to a community activity, something profane".