Abstract
Portraits and video coverage of the pope are familiar and standardized, strongly centered on religious events. Popes are pictured giving blessings, celebrating mass, and offering wisdom; popes are seldom presented to the public as taking selfies, addressing governments, or identifying themselves as the servants of “others.” Pope Francis, however, has firmly and consistently rejected this dichotomizing of the religious and the secular. Instead, he has fulfilled his own call “to show concern for the building of a better world” (Evangelii Gaudium, 150) through his continuing outreach, whether in Saint Peter’s Square or traveling throughout the world. Moreover, Francis has deliberately amplified his message by facilitating a visual record of his actions for delivery through print, broadcast, and electronic media. But how does coverage of Francis compare with that accorded his two immediate predecessors, John Paul II and Benedict XVI? More specifically, what do front-page articles and photographs reveal about these popes? About the papacy?
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Notes
- 1.
Tracy Wilkinson, “The Election of Pope Francis; Humility, Simple Life Led Jesuit to Papacy,” The Los Angeles Times, March 14, 2013, print edition, A1.
- 2.
Emily Schmall and Larry Rohter, “A Conservative with a Common Touch,” The New York Times , March 14, 2013, print edition, A1.
- 3.
Francis, “Evangelii Gaudium, Apostolic Exhortation of the Holy Father Francis to the Bishops, Clergy, Consecrated Persons, and the Lay Faithful on the Proclamation of the Gospel in Today’s World,” The Vatican Website, November 24, 2013, http://w2.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/apost_exhortations/documents/papa-francesco_esortazione-ap_20131124_evangelii-gaudium.html, 184. Emphasis added.
- 4.
E. J. Dionne Jr., “Resurrection, Pope Francis Brings the Freshness of the Gospel to the Catholic Church,” Foreign Policy (December 2013): 88–89; Roland Flamini, “Pope Francis, Resurrecting Catholicism’s Image?” World Affairs (September/October 2013): 25–33; Jo Renee Formicola, “The Vatican, the American Bishops, and the Church–State Ramifications of Clerical Sexual Abuse,” Journal of Church and State 46, no. 3 (2004): 479–502; Richard R. Gaillardetz, “The ‘Francis Moment,’ A New Kairos for Catholic Ecclesiology; Presidential Address,” Catholic Theological Society of America Proceedings 69 (2014): 63–80; Maurice Glassman, “Beloved of the People: The Popularity and Political Mastery of Pope Francis,” Juncture 21, no. 4 (2015): 319–23; Margaret B. Melady, The Rhetoric of Pope John Paul II, The Pastoral Visit as a New Vocabulary of the Sacred (Westport, CT: Praeger, 1999); Shawn Tully, “This Pope Means Business,” Fortune, August 14, 2014, http://fortune.com/2014/08/14/this-pope-means-business/
- 5.
Mariano Barbato, “A State, a Diplomat, and a Transnational Church: The Multi-layered Actorness of the Holy See,” Perspectives 21, no. 2 (2013): 27–48; Ted G. Jelen, “Catholic Politics in the United States: Challenges in the Past, Present, and Future,” The Forum 11, no. 4 (2014): 589–602.
- 6.
Barbato, “A State, a Diplomat, and a Transnational Church: The Multi-layered Actorness of the Holy See”; Alan Chong and Jodok Troy, “A Universal Sacred Mission and the Universal Secular Organization: The Holy See and the United Nations,” Politics, Religion & Ideology 12, no. 3 (2011): 335–54. See also Marie Gayte, “‘I Told the White House, If They Give One to the Pope, I May Ask for One’: The American Reception to the Establishment of Diplomatic Relations Between the United States and the Vatican in 1984,” Journal of Church and State 54, no. 1 (2011): 33–56.
- 7.
Boris Vukicevic, “Pope Francis and the Challenges of Inter-Civilization Diplomacy,” Revista Brasileira de Política Internacional 58, no. 2 (2015): 65–79.
- 8.
Holy See Press Office, Press Release, “Note on the Diplomatic Relations of the Holy See,” January 9, 2017, The Vatican Website, https://press.vatican.va/content/salastampa/en/bollettino/pubblico/2017/01/09/170109b.html
- 9.
Barbato, “A State, a Diplomat, and a Transnational Church: The Multi-layered Actorness of the Holy See”; Chong and Troy, “A Universal Sacred Mission and the Universal Secular Organization: The Holy See and the United Nations.”
- 10.
Roland Flamini, “Peter and Caesar: Is Francis Shifting the Vatican’s Worldview?” World Affairs (July/August 2014): 25–33.
- 11.
“Pope Francis Prays in Istanbul’s Iconic Blue Mosque, Visits Hagia Sophia,” Journal of Turkish Weekly, December 1, 2014.
- 12.
See, for example, Emma Dwight, “Dissecting a Miracle, Pope Francis the Peacemaker,” Harvard International Review (Spring 2015): 7–9.
- 13.
Vukicevic, “Pope Francis and the Challenges of Inter-Civilization Diplomacy.”
- 14.
Frank Newport, “Americans, Including Catholics, Say Birth Control is Morally OK,” Gallup Politics, May 22, 2012, http://www.gallup.com/poll/154799/americans-including-catholics-say-birth-control-morally.aspx
- 15.
“Message of Pope Francis for the 48th World Communications Day, Communications at the Service of an Authentic Culture of Encounter,” June 1, 2014, https://w2.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/messages/communications/documents/papa-francesco_20140124_messaggio-comunicazioni-sociali.html
- 16.
New York City is surpassed only by the Chicago metropolitan area, which has a population that is 34 percent self-identified as Catholic. Kelly Heyboer, “‘Rock Star’ Pope Francis Finds U.S. Catholic Church at a Crossroads,” NJ.com [New Jersey.com], September 23, 2015, http://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/2015/09/rock_star_pope_francis_finds_us_catholic_church_at.html
- 17.
This photograph was coded as a papal portrait, because only the Pope was in the photograph, and as religious, because it depicted the Pope in prayer. See The New York Times , May 26, 2014, print edition, 1.
- 18.
Flamini, “Peter and Caesar: Is Francis Shifting the Vatican’s Worldview?”
- 19.
For this photograph, see The New York Times , September 19, 2015, print edition, 1.
- 20.
James Crossley and Jackie Harrison, “The Mediation of the Distinction of ‘Religion’ and ‘Politics’ by the UK Press on the Occasion of Pope Benedict XVI’s State Visit to the UK,” Political Theology 16, no. 4 (2015): 329–45.
- 21.
Robert Booth Fowler, “The Roman Catholic Church in ‘Protestant’ American Today,” The Forum 11, no. 4 (2014): 721–42; Richard R. Gaillardetz, “The ‘Francis Moment,’ A New Kairos for Catholic Ecclesiology; Presidential Address,” Catholic Theological Society of America Proceedings 69 (2014): 63–80.
- 22.
Tom Gallagher, “The Story Behind National Geographic’s Pope Francis Story,” The National Catholic Reporter, September 23, 2015, https://www.ncronline.org/blogs/francis-chronicles/story-behind-national-geographic-s-pope-francis-story
- 23.
Maurizio Mori, “An Address to Doctors by Pope Francis (15 November 2014): A Doctrinal Mistake and a Lot of Common Sense Presented with Savoir-Faire,” The Journal of Christian Bioethics 21, no. 1 (2015): 109–29.
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Borrelli, M. (2018). “To Show Concern”: Early Coverage of John Paul II, Benedict XVI, and Francis in the American National News Media. In: Lyon, A., Gustafson, C., Manuel, P. (eds) Pope Francis as a Global Actor. Palgrave Studies in Religion, Politics, and Policy. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-71377-9_6
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