archives
Survey finds pope's visit got a big chunk of U.S. media's attention
Posted on May 7, 2008 13:06pm CST.By Patricia Zapor
Catholic News Service
WASHINGTON -- The news media gave Pope Benedict XVI's visit to the United States in April more coverage that week than any topic except the 2008 election campaign, according to an analysis of reporting by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life and Pew's Project for Excellence in Journalism.
The analysis released May 6 found that coverage of the pope's April 15-20 visit took up 16 percent of the week's "news hole."
Personal stories of World War II Europe make the horrors more real
Posted on May 7, 2008 16:06pm CST.| NCR Book Club |
Reviewed by Rachelle Linner, Catholic News Service
| DIARY OF A WITNESS, 1940-1943 by Raymond-Raoul Lambert. Translated by Isabel Best. Ivan R. Dee (2007). 288 pages $27.50 |
To understand a period as complex as World War II and the Holocaust we need to read both trained historians and ordinary men and women. Historians provide a broad overview and an understanding of context but it is only individuals who can communicate the intimate details of what it is like to endure the suffering of mind, body and soul that is the reality of war.
Personal narratives can elicit the empathy and identification that move the reader to compassion and insight. The two books under consideration, while not among the central Holocaust narratives, are important in fleshing out our knowledge of those terrible years.
