In my formative years, when hookers were only found on rugby pitches and generals were the only people with aides, there were three main Catholic publications in church porches throughout the country.
Their readership was quite distinct in both class and character.
At the cheap and cheerful end there was The Universe, the working Catholic man's newspaper.
The Catholic middle classes read the broadsheet Catholic Herald and, as Sister Catherine Walsh OP used to say: "It's the only Catholic newspaper run by Catholics, boys". And so it was and still is.
And then the Upper Class Catholics had a rather upper class publication called The Tablet. This was and is, in magazine format and carried rather more copy than pictures; it would then have been described as "an intellectual read".
I think this hierarchy still stands except that The Tablet, as we all know, has become the mouthpiece of liberal crassness; somewhat left of Arthur Scargill.
But it still retains, (among Catholics of the cafeteria variety) a sort of air of pseudo intellectuality, of being unassailable as an organ of the thinking Catholic.
The once exclusive readership has drifted so that both the lower and middle classes like to be seen with a copy under their arm.
It lends them, so they believe, a sort of pew credibility; it adds an air of 'better than thou' to those who buy a copy and then, on returning home, consign it to the re-cycling bin unread.
A group of young Catholics has started a campaign aimed at closing down The Tablet, (Tabula Delenda Est) I wish them every success in their endeavours.
But we all need to challenge this false air of intellectual authority that surrounds the editorial team and their Directors at The Tablet.
We need to question those who wave their copy around as proof of their forward thinking capacity and charitably point out the truth of the matter to them.
The Tablet is not now the thinking Catholic's magazine; it has evolved into 'Pseud's Corner'.
Please inform your Bishop, Parish Priest and you fellow parishioners of this fact.
In this clip below you can see three Catholics.
Can you tell The Tablet reader from The Universe reader or The Catholic Herald reader?
There's also a final clip showing an interview believed to be with a young Clifford Longley
Their readership was quite distinct in both class and character.
At the cheap and cheerful end there was The Universe, the working Catholic man's newspaper.
The Catholic middle classes read the broadsheet Catholic Herald and, as Sister Catherine Walsh OP used to say: "It's the only Catholic newspaper run by Catholics, boys". And so it was and still is.
And then the Upper Class Catholics had a rather upper class publication called The Tablet. This was and is, in magazine format and carried rather more copy than pictures; it would then have been described as "an intellectual read".
I think this hierarchy still stands except that The Tablet, as we all know, has become the mouthpiece of liberal crassness; somewhat left of Arthur Scargill.
But it still retains, (among Catholics of the cafeteria variety) a sort of air of pseudo intellectuality, of being unassailable as an organ of the thinking Catholic.
The once exclusive readership has drifted so that both the lower and middle classes like to be seen with a copy under their arm.
It lends them, so they believe, a sort of pew credibility; it adds an air of 'better than thou' to those who buy a copy and then, on returning home, consign it to the re-cycling bin unread.
A group of young Catholics has started a campaign aimed at closing down The Tablet, (Tabula Delenda Est) I wish them every success in their endeavours.
But we all need to challenge this false air of intellectual authority that surrounds the editorial team and their Directors at The Tablet.
We need to question those who wave their copy around as proof of their forward thinking capacity and charitably point out the truth of the matter to them.
The Tablet is not now the thinking Catholic's magazine; it has evolved into 'Pseud's Corner'.
Please inform your Bishop, Parish Priest and you fellow parishioners of this fact.
In this clip below you can see three Catholics.
Can you tell The Tablet reader from The Universe reader or The Catholic Herald reader?
There's also a final clip showing an interview believed to be with a young Clifford Longley
