CBS News review: Casual displays of ignorance about catholic church

I watch CBS Mornings nearly every day and find most of the substance in the first half hour. The program is top-heavy with celebrities, sports (a matter of personal taste), lifestyle features and promotions (too much time devoted to teasing upcoming features and other CBS projects), but it's generally a harmless way to start my day and still get at least a small dose of news.

However, I wish someone in authority at CBS would advise the happy hosts (they move ever farther from serious journalism) that they are NOT informed about the Catholic Church. The March 17 remarks about Mr. Butker's commencement address included Tony's erroneous comment (issued in the usual, "Well, everybody knows" style) that Butker's misogyny was clearly in line with Catholic teaching. In fact, Catholic teaching upholds the dignity and sanctity of a wide range of vocations, including those of single professional women. There are self-identified Catholics who agree with Mr. Butker; there are self-identified Catholics who practice Santeria. Neither fact changes Church doctrine.

This was not the first egregious example of a host or all the hosts dismissing Catholic belief or practice as "well, what can you expect from those foolish Catholics?" Another memorable incidence occurred when, some time ago but since Nate joined full-time, all the hosts enjoyed misrepresenting Catholic teaching about Baptism as they discussed a flap about a priest who'd been straying from the prescribed Catholic script for the sacrament. They based their comments, it would seem to me, on a too-quick read of half the story and their mistaken confidence that they knew all about Catholics.

A generation ago, when I was earning the journalism degree that enabled me to support myself and my son for a lifetime, I was taught that an error "contrary to fact" was always serious and always bad journalism. The CBS Mornings folks seem to have missed that class. I was also taught, and learned, that the most important thing journalists have to offer is the truth, and that if one's audience discovers that the publication or program is inaccurate in one area, the level of trust and belief in the whole product quickly declines.

Casually disregarding the reality or importance of the teaching of the oldest and arguably most sophisticated Christian Church is an expression of bias towards its millions of American adherents. It is personally insulting to me.

The "slime" episode almost sent me running to the arms of CNN. Was this from the network that gave us Walter Cronkite? But I know that stunt journalism has been around forever, and I have a vague childhood memory of J Fred Muggs. (I know, "Today" was NBC, I fact checked -- but the analogy stands!)

Please, friends, you can do better than this.

A response would be appreciated.

Elizabeth O'Connor

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