Vatican gives holy seal of approval to its top ten ‘pop milestones’

[Dominic_Brother]

No, the average person is responsible to learn. L’Osservatore Romano is not responsible for misconceptions people have about it; the British newspaper is at fault here for misrepresenting what L’Osservatore Romano is and does. L’Osservatore Romano is not responsible for being nothing other than what it says it is, and doing nothing other than what it says it does.

I have not seen the original article from the L’Osservatore Romano so I cannot say what the Britsh paper has misrepresented or what was truthful.** What did they really misrepresent since you seem to know?**

If the average person has a duty to learn, we should not put obstacles in their way. For example, why make a story difficult to understand? Why hide it’s purpose? If there are misconceptions about this story, then lets try to correct them.

Was the L’Osservatore Romano just reporting a news story here or was it trying to educate us on some songs? I still don’t understand what their purpose was in creating this top ten list. Tell me what the L’Osservatore Romano wants us to learn from the story they printed.

 

[Lujack]

I have not seen the original article from the L’Osservatore Romano so I cannot say what the Britsh paper has misrepresented or what was truthful.** What did they really misrepresent since you seem to know?**

“Vatican gives holy seal of approval…”. Right there. Let’s use a different example. If I made a list of the top ten defensive players in the history of American football, I’d have to include Lawrence Taylor on there. Now LT was one of the greatest linebackers of all time; he was also out of control and a cocaine addict. By putting him on my list, am I saying that LT is a good guy and that I approve of his actions?

No. But I am saying that he played some good football. And that’s all that L’Osservatore Romano is doing here. Just making some commentary.

If the average person has a duty to learn, we should not put obstacles in their way. For example, why make a story difficult to understand? Why hide it’s purpose? If there are misconceptions about this story, then lets try to correct them.

But it doesn’t try to hide its purpose. Its a list of ten important pop milestones. That’s all that it is. There is no further purpose than that. Like any newspaper, it includes editorials and human interest stories. To mix things up, they made up a top ten list of pop music milestones. It isn’t a very good list (no Zeppelin and no Springsteen?) but a list is all it is.

Was the L’Osservatore Romano just reporting a news story here or was it trying to educate us on some songs? I still don’t understand what their purpose was in creating this top ten list. Tell me what the L’Osservatore Romano wants us to learn from the story they printed.

It wants to make a Top 10 list of songs, and to take a look at the history of pop music. That’s a good enough reason for a newspaper to do something.

 

[John_Bradley]

L’Osservatore Romano is not the Vatican newspaper it is the “semi-official” newspaper published in the Vatican; nor does it speak for the Magisterium. The newspaper listed its top 10 Rock Albums not the Vatican’s.

 

[Dominic_Brother]

Its not a guide to moral teaching. Its the Vatican newspaper.

Thank you, I now understand and have a better understanding that some of their stories are opinions and their stories must be treated a such. I don’t mean to be cynical here or in my other replies below, but I will treat any story from the L’Osservatore Romano with extreme caution.

You can rely on L’Osservatore Romano to be accurate and reliable.

I don’t believe the L’Osservatore Romano is infallible. The fact that some secular media have reported the top ten story with the stamp of Vatican approval most likely means the L’Osservatore Romano did a poor job at reporting the story in the first place. I’m not going to totally blame the secular media. They saw a story and jumped on it.

Why should they? Should a car have a label on it “This is not an airplane.”?

If I buy a car at a dealership (and as the L’Osservatore Romano is accurate and reliable as you quote), then I expect the car to have no defects as advertised. I expect the story to be a decent one. The top ten story should be written in a section of the newspaper such as an editorial page or something like that. This tells us these stories are opinions, it is not news.

But it doesn’t try to hide its purpose. Its a list of ten important pop milestones. That’s all that it is. There is no further purpose than that.

You are probably right here that they are trying not to hide a purpose such as promoting music which they think is good but could actually be bad. But I hope they explanined why they thought each album was a milestone and why it was important. Having a list with no commentary as to why it’s in the list in the first place is simply poor reporting.

I have to go by what the secular media is reporting because I have not seen the original from the L’Osservatore Romano, It really feels like the L’Osservatore Romano did a real bad job at reporting this top ten list.

 

[Dominic_Brother]

L’Osservatore Romano is not the Vatican newspaper it is the “semi-official” newspaper published in the Vatican; nor does it speak for the Magisterium. The newspaper listed its top 10 Rock Albums not the Vatican’s.

Thank you, this is what we ALL need to know about the L’Osservatore Romano. It is a “semi-official” newspaper published in the Vatican.

I think it is safe to conclude now from you and poster LUJAK and others, that the L’Osservatore Romano’s intent was not promote the albums in their list as good ones and to convey a “message” to the readers that albums that sound like them are good to buy because the Vatican approves them. They only are reporting an opinion which is theirs that these albums were important in an historical sense, such as a milestone.

However, for me, they were probably negligent in the way the reported this story.

 

[utah_rose]

I heard the same thing said about the New York Times except it does not operate out of the Vatican. I don’t waste my money buying the New York Times.

If the news reports of the L’Osservatore Romano is not meant to serve as a guide to moral teaching, then that’s how we have to treat the newspaper.

If the article they wrote was meant for us to think about it, then great, I accept that. **BUT I hope they said clearly said in the article, “please think about this list we created, we are only writing it so that you can think about it”. **

Otherwise, L’Osservatore Romano is using the doctrine of “spin” to promote something; just like the New York Times does when it “spins” their stories. Maybe the reporters got a payola; more people will buy the “Thriller” album now. Did the Jackson estate get free publicity?

Again, I don’t have the official re-print of the story, only what I hear on the grapevine.

I think I said something like this somewhere else in this thread, the average guy on the street does not treat a newspaper of the Vatican like the New York Times.The average person does and wants to treat the L’Osservatore Romano newspaper with stories it can rely on.

We have to protect the average person who reads these kinds of bad stories, and better still the poor who are poor in the intellectual sense. That’s what we are doing in this thread.

Again, let me repeat, I don’t have the official re-print of the story.

I agree with you 100%. The trouble is that the secular media picks up stories like this, and immediately everyone thinks that this is what the “Pope” thinks. If anything, it should have been stressed that this was one reporter’s opinion, not the Church’s.

The Times is notorious for picking up stories like these and if the Vatican paper doesn’t give it a spin, they will.

Pope Paul seemed to be more aware of modern music rather than Pope Benedict. I would almost bet that Pope Benedict isn’t aware of most of them (of course he’s heard of the Beatles).

It seems not only the Times spins stories but this Vatican Paper does too.

Do they realize also that some of this is trying parent’s hands who are trying to teach their kids to be prudent in listening to popular music?

Some of this music reverts to the sixties, when many of the rock stars were on drugs–certainly not a good influence.

And whatever anyone says, character counts, so I don’t think Michael Jackson belongs there. Kids look up to rock stars–they always have and no matter how he sang, he sure wasn’t the “king of music” that the secular media made him out to be.

In fact, Thriller, for all of it’s fancy dancing reverts to something dark, and I certainly would not be idolizing it.

Again, my opinion from a senior old fogie, but I do remember the sixties as a bad time for this type of music (excepting Simon and Garfukel). And if they wanted to mention someone who was very popular during these times and had something to say, why not John Denver?

 

[Holly3278]

Personally, I think this is pretty cool and will be forwarding this list to my best friend, Darrell.

 

[Havard]

You know what happens when you play Country music backwards? You get your wife back, your pickup back, your dog back…

I love it.

 

[silentstar]

Having lived and studied in the Eternal City as they call it, I think that most people don’t understand how the Vatican papers work. They are truly newspapers. They are not propaganda machines for the Catholic Church.

As you say, they will write about popular culture, politics, fashion and what have you. They also publish news that comes out of the official Vatican News Agency. In this sense, it is the official Vatican newspaper, in that the Vatican New Agency gives Zenit and L’Observatore the first opportunity to report, before they send a press release to other papers in Rome.

What the writer in the British paper did was to take each quote and twist and turn it. I don’t like that. That’s dishonest.

Fraternally,

Br. JR, OSF

It seems like what actually happened is that two journalists wrote a story for the newspaper and shared their opinions, and this became known as “the Vatican approves.” I guess that sells more papers than saying “Giuseppe Fiorentino and Gaetano Vallini, the authors, say so.”

I don’t see where anyone at the Vatican is actually quoted anywhere in this article.

 

[JReducation]

It seems like what actually happened is that two journalists wrote a story for the newspaper and shared their opinions, and this became known as “the Vatican approves.” I guess that sells more papers than saying “Giuseppe Fiorentino and Gaetano Vallini, the authors, say so.”

I don’t see where anyone at the Vatican is actually quoted anywhere in this article.

I recently read an article where the editor of the Observatore was asked about this point. It was a strange question, because the topic was something else. That being said, the editor mentioned that this was the Observatore’s list and the story was paraphrased and spun. He didn’t go into great detail, because the question was way off topic. But I was glad to hear it, because it clarified this point.

As I said above, neither Zenit nor the Observatore are the mouthpiece of the Vatican. The Vatican Press Office is. The Vatican Press Office uses these two papers and one more that only appears in Italy to make all of their comments to the press. The Vatican rarely deals with Reuters or the AP.

I don’t kniow why they avoid it, but MY GUESS is that because the staff at the Holy See is international and multicultural, they don’t all have the same appreciation for either Reuter or AP.

Fraternally,

Br. JR, OSF

 

[presidentjlh]

In fact, Thriller, for all of it’s fancy dancing reverts to something dark, and I certainly would not be idolizing it.

Aw…come on. Let’s not be so dang oversensitive to everything. I mean, I guess Halloween’s bad as well, because we promote it as “scary”.

 

[Fan_of_Francis]

You know what happens when you play Country music backwards? You get your wife back, your pickup back, your dog back…

 

[JReducation]

Aw…come on. Let’s not be so dang oversensitive to everything. I mean, I guess Halloween’s bad as well, because we promote it as “scary”.

What you’re saying has weight. As St. John of the Cross wrote the Dark Night is a metaphor for the absence of those things that stand between us and God. When we look at these things we have to be very careful not to replace them with an attachment to our opinions. Our heart and mind must always be open to seeing the glory of God beyond our opinions as St. Ignatius of Loyola taught. If we become over sensitive, we risk becoming saints with sour faces as St. Teresa of Avila described them. The balance is achieved when we identify what is essential for our fulfillment of the glory of God without losing our inner joy as St. Francis said.

Fraternally,

Br. JR, OSF

 

[Dale_M]

I don’t kniow why they avoid it, but MY GUESS is that because the staff at the Holy See is international and multicultural, they don’t all have the same appreciation for either Reuter or AP.

You may be right, but I think it is a mistake on their part. Reuters, the AP and the AFP are international and are featured by news services world wide. They have a far greater reach than Zenit or L’Osservatore and the questions their reporters ask would help dispel some of the misconceptions that result when secular journalists rely on second hand sources.

 

[baylee]

Don’t they have more important things to do?

And this is exactly what the MS media would like you and everyone else to ask…that’s why they reported on it.

This is starting to really **** me off.

 

[baylee]

You may be right, but I think it is a mistake on their part. Reuters, the AP and the AFP are international and are featured by news services world wide. They have a far greater reach than Zenit or L’Osservatore and the questions their reporters ask would help dispel some of the misconceptions that result when secular journalists rely on second hand sources.

Hmmm…the recent report regarding the Oakland priest came from the AP…and that was sooooo truthful.