Pope calls for ‘communicators of hope’
January 24, 2025
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CWN Editor's Note: In his message for the 59th World Day for Social Communications, Pope Francis took up the theme of the Jubilee Year, urging communications professionals to think of themselves as “communicators of hope.”
“Too often today, communication generates not hope, but fear and despair, prejudice and resentment, fanaticism and even hatred,” the Pope wrote. He observed with regret the spread of “disinformation and polarization, as a few centers of power control an unprecedented mass of data and information.”
The papal message called attention to another unfortunate development, “what we might call the ‘programmed dispersion of attention’ through digital systems that, by profiling us according to the logic of the market, modify our perception of reality.”
To counter these trends the Pontiff called for a commitment not only to truth but to a positive outlook, offering encouragement as well as information. He saw the goal as: “A communication capable of speaking to the heart, arousing not passionate reactions of defensiveness and anger, but attitudes of openness and friendship.”
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