Report by Prof. Dr. Ivan Dimitrov, presented during the Sixteenth World/Global Meeting of the Bulgarian Media, held at the Rila Monastery (Bulgaria) on October 16 and 17 this year:
I will allow myself to begin with some definitions and relatively indisputable findings on the subject of the first panel of the Faith and Media meeting. “Faith is a living vision of what we hope for and a revelation of what is not seen,” wrote the highly educated and truly “verbal” preacher of first-century Christianity, St. Paul the Apostle (Heb. 11: 1). But in the program of this important meeting in this sacred place, the word faith is undoubtedly understood as a religion with all its accompanying forms of religious teaching, cult and role in society. The media, on the other hand, are our intermediaries (or “mediums”), who collect, analyze and disseminate information about events, personalities and trends.
On the other hand, modern media is the most important (for understandable reasons) form of information and entertainment. This fact can not be ignored in our time, when the connection of people with organized religions may be weakened, but the spiritual needs of these same people remain great.
It is widely acknowledged that when considering the phenomenon of media in each case we must take into account various factors, such as who owns the media, what is the legislation, what financial interests affect, what ads are displayed, etc., as well as social and the cultural norms of society. The latter are particularly important in the sense that each media (religious or not) does not send its messages to a completely homogeneous audience, but to people with their own social and cultural beliefs, on the basis of which they are aware of the messages that the media offer them.
The claim that “faith creates religion” is also indisputable. And to a great extent, under the influence of religion, culture is formed. The whole culture of Egypt, of Asia Minor, of ancient Greece, of the medieval West, of Byzantium, of medieval Bulgaria, is inextricably linked with religion. There is a spiritual life in man because there is a word in it, ie a language consisting not only of signals and signs, but also of expressions that convey a certain meaning. The existence of a spiritual life (from which animals and electronic machines are deprived) in man is precisely what enables him to be religious, as well as to have any other knowledge and creativity.
The high religions, unlike the primitive ones, re-educate the thought and thus raise the word to unprecedented heights, give it new poetic riches, master the writing, give birth to law or transform the existing one, take in service almost all arts and skills, create monumental construction. Even entirely secular art still looks back, declares its religious past to be a classic, and imitates it in particularly solemn and ceremonial occasions. Because everything sublime was once sacred. And what is true of these arts is true of culture as a whole. The religion that gave rise to it can be seen everywhere in it. Our language, the language of all Christian or Christian-educated peoples, of all our poetry and literature, bears traces of its rootedness in the language of the Bible, in the Christian religion, and in the life connected or influenced by it (including the liturgical and theological language). Moreover, our very thought, our understanding of the world and of people, our whole spiritual life, is still searching, and when it is searching, it finds support in this religion, from which our culture has radiated, even though many of us to refuse to consider it their religion. Despite the refusal, it is a non-setting sun that pierces hearts and warms souls with its divine light. [1]
How is faith present in the media? In very different ways, according to the media and the public interest in the faith. And in the “according to the media” category, I would like to draw attention to a factor that we cannot ignore. These are the people working in the media. Very often in the Bulgarian media (I mean in our country, where I can follow them more regularly) programs or individual reports are made, interviews are taken, etc. by some minority religions, and it turns out that specific people working in the given media are their supporters, ie it is not a question of objective public interest, but a form of propaganda of the respective religion through “its people” working in the media. This is also observed in the education system – from kindergartens to universities (there are many examples). Here, too, we are not talking about pluralism, but about disproportionate coverage of religious ideas and practices by the media.
Is there a problem with that? Yes, there is, because the religious truths, call them teachings, and their “living”, practiced by the vast majority of citizens of Bulgaria do not find proportional coverage by the media. This is obvious and does not need to be proven, although it is not difficult to do so. But I only highlight this issue, because the program of the current meeting does not allow going into the depth of the problem.
For the Church as the main representative of the religious faith among the Bulgarian people, the media are a good opportunity for spreading the Word of God and for a living sermon. The church tradition in publishing Christian newspapers, magazines, brochures dates back to Renaissance times. All Bulgarian public speech and official literature originated from the Church after the creation of the Bulgarian script and the translation of the Holy Scriptures by the holy brothers Cyril and Methodius and their students. And so it has been for more than a millennium in our lands. Since the 19th century, the Roman Catholic Church and Protestant missions have been actively involved in this Christian enlightenment of our people. But after half a century of aggressive state atheism in the second half of the 20th century, this seems to be forgotten and replaced in the public space with another spiritual food, another worldview.
Today, the Church, through its educational and social mission, cooperates with the secular media, which have the opportunity to convey its message to the most diverse strata of society. This cooperation is not easy and therefore not always successful. Expressions of dissatisfaction with the way the media cover the teachings and activities of the Church are often heard in church circles. This is a rather complex issue, but undoubtedly the interaction of the Church and the secular media presupposes mutual responsibility. The information provided to the journalist and transmitted by him to the public must be reliable. The views of the clergy or other representatives of the Church, disseminated through the media, must be in accordance with its teachings and position on public issues.
The relationship between the Church and the secular media is sometimes hampered by the clergy and lay Christians, for example in cases of unjustified refusal of journalists to gain access to information or painful reactions to correct journalistic criticism. Such issues must be resolved in a spirit of peaceful dialogue, in order to remove confusion and continue cooperation, which has no alternative.
In order to reach people more easily and quickly, the Church does not rely solely on non-church media. Along with its traditional print media, it also creates its own electronic media, which work where more successfully, where not so much, but still strive to satisfy the interest in the topics of faith and life according to this faith. And in the Faculty of Theology of Sofia University “St. Kliment Ohridski ”there is also a master’s program“ Church and Media ”. It aims to prepare specialists for work in the media on religious issues, as well as to enable non-theologians who have interests in the media coverage of religious issues to get acquainted with its specifics. We hope that the graduating specialists “church journalists” will know the peculiarities of media communication, but at the same time will be competent in the field of religions, church structure and religious teachings and traditions in our country.
In conclusion, I will allow myself to quote an interesting statement, according to which three different approaches can be observed in relation to the modern media. One is their “deification” when they are absolutized and attributed divine qualities, as was recently done for Google after some Americans founded the “Church of Google” because of the abundant information that makes it look like a kind of deity. The other is the “demonization” of the media, when they are considered demonic means, the source of all the evils that exist in society. And the third approach is the good use of the media, to see them as a gift from God, a means of good organization of society, and the goal is for man to dominate them and the whole creation, not to be their slave.
And we remember and do not forget the words of Jesus Christ: “And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free” (John 8:32).
