On January 24, 2018, Pope Francis released a statement about fake news. It’s worth reading even if you are not a Francis fan.
As you would expect, it’s a homily (for Protestants, a sermon). His use of the story of Eden’s serpent is engaging. Francis equates the serpent with the Devil. (I would not.) Anyway, Mr. Serpent-Devil tempts Eve (never Adam) by giving her fake news, telling her a lie. The lie’s effectiveness consists in it’s sounding like a Big Truth, the one God is hiding from Eve and Adam, for their own good, of course. If you are in the know, the Big Truth is: You can live forever. And the Devil can put you in the know. Here, he says, have a bite.
Tradition says the instrument of truth was an apple. More likely it was a fig. Today it’s a tweet.
Francis pleads for honest and true dialogue coupled with honest, dig-deep journalism written by reporters who care about people:
“I would like, then, to invite everyone to promote a journalism of peace. By that, I do not mean the saccharine kind of journalism that refuses to acknowledge the existence of serious problems or smacks of sentimentalism. On the contrary, I mean a journalism that is truthful and opposed to falsehoods, rhetorical slogans, and sensational headlines. A journalism created by people for people, one that is at the service of all, especially those – and they are the majority in our world – who have no voice. A journalism less concentrated on breaking news than on exploring the underlying causes of conflicts, in order to promote deeper understanding and contribute to their resolution by setting in place virtuous processes. A journalism committed to pointing out alternatives to the escalation of shouting matches and verbal violence.”
Who could argue with this? Journalism, the pope declares, is a mission. I’m sure for him “mission” is a term of elevation, like “calling,” not like the missions of missionaries, whom some journalists would regard as agents of religious imperialism.
The truth, the pope says, is not only true facts but also the life that proceeds from them. And the guarantor of truth is God. You expected that, right? Fair enough; the pope is a Christian.
But here’s the problem: Men and women of God, from the pope down through the hierarchy, are not gods. In theory, they know they are human spokespersons. In theory, they know they get things wrong. Like us, like the snake, they too lie, are misinformed, or are self-deceived. The problem is that there is no way to get the pure, simple truth straight from God, the guarantor of truth. Always there is an evangelist or pope or priest or pastor or rabbi or imam speaking for God. And their speaking for often becomes speaking as: Listen to what I am saying as if God were talking through me.
I love the talking through metaphor. Jeff Dunham is a ventriloquist. His puppets are funny and controversial. Watch Dunham on YouTube and meet his friends, Walter, a crabby old white racist, or Ahmed, a skeleton who wants to blow everything up. Jeff literally talks through, or talks as, each character. We viewers don’t know how much Walter or Ahmed speaks for Jeff, the performer-animator on stage. Jeff can always sidestep by declaring to his manikin: I didn’t say that; you said that. A viewer can never know “the truth,” so the truth cannot make us free. Rather the multiple truths issuing from the mouths of puppets make us laugh. We in the audience are always spinning among perspectives–never quite getting at THE truth–and laughing at ourselves when we can’t.
The problem is not only that the Devil is a ventriloquist, presumably speaking God’s truth, it is that clergy too are ventriloquists. What they say may be truthful or not, biased or not. They may convey true news but they also may convey fake news.
Recently, the pope formally apologized to Chileans for sexual abuse in the church. A good first step. But, as Francis was leaving, he snarled back at a journalist, “There is not one shred of proof against him [a bishop accused of molesting children]. It’s all calumny. Is that clear?”
Chilean courts have found otherwise. So pick your devil: the journalist and courts versus the pope defending his own. In Chile confidence in the church has dropped from 80% in 1997 to less than 40% in 2017. The papal visit might have helped stem the tide of distrust, but the pope’s accusation of calumny undermined his credibility, leaving us in the audience spinning, trying to figure out who is the serpent and who is the spokesperson for God.
Unfortunately, the joke isn’t remotely funny.