“Shame, Fear, and Compassion”
“Shame, Fear, and Compassion”
Media Coverage of Catholicism During the First Decade of the AIDS Crisis
Secular and Catholic media reacted differently in the first decade of the AIDS crisis. These differences are apparent in an examination of reports on two 1987 stories—priests dying from the AIDS virus, and conflict over the US bishops’ pastoral letter on AIDS—from seven different news sources, secular and religious. The secular press used sensation and conflict frames to report the news, reflecting the enduring values (in Herbert Gans’s term) shared by the secular news outlets, which cast the Church as antithetical to American identity. Despite a variation in ideological leaning among the Catholic papers, their theological value system, suggested that the meaning of life and the heart of Catholic identity reside in active compassion. The debate over AIDS offered Catholics two alternatives. While the secular press depicted the choices as liberal or conservative—and implicitly secular (American) or religious (Catholic)—the sectarian press presented them as two theological orientations and options for loving service.
Keywords: AIDS crisis, Catholic New York, enduring values, Herbert Gans, Los Angeles Times, National Catholic News Service, National Catholic Register, National Catholic Reporter, New York Times, Tidings
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