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Father Grassi asked to live the coherence of communication

"Communication must show the positive gestures so they can multiply"

The Spiritual Father of Felices los Niños Foundation asked to keep a careful balance in what is shown in the media. He said that a picture of defeatism can cause a gloomy attitude in man. "We can harvest much more solidarity, love and positive emotion by trying to take the initiative in communicating encouraging issues" he stated.

Buenos Aires, Sunday, October 13, 2002.- Father Julio Grassi, the founder and Spiritual Father of Felices los Niños Foundation declared tonight that "communication must show positive gestures so they can multiply."

"Much care must be taken balancing what is shown because if on a screen about 90 percent is a picture of defeatism the consequence will be a gloomy spirit in man", he said in his weekly column in the "La Manga" broadcasting which he conducts for ten years now at Radio Rivadavia (AM 630 kHz, Sundays from 02:00 to 05:00), referring to the 3rd Congress of Catholic Communicators which was organized by the Social Communication Commission of the Argentine Episcopacy and held at Universidad Catolica Argentina in Buenos Aires.

Father Grassi also referred to the statements made to La Nacion newspaper by Monsignor John Patrick Foley, Pope John Paul II's man at the Papal Council for Social Communications, which he has presided for 17 years.

Monsignor Foley held that "in crisis times media must inspire hope".

He also talked about the "three work pillars" communicators must lean on: "to be truthful, to look after personal dignity and to contribute to general welfare".

Father Grassi said that "communication nowadays has a prime role in our society and must start living the coherence of communication."

"Communication is transmitting the sadness of a nation lacking bread, but it is also transmitting the hopes of a community which has found the solidarity of nongovernmental organizations, of Human Rights bodies and of all people who managed to make sustenance possible in the slums", reflected the Spiritual Father of Felices los Niños Foundation, a common welfare entity which gives comprehensive assistance to 6,300 children and teenagers at risk through 52 works in 20 localities, comprising 20 dwelling homes, 15 day-care centers, 9 schools, 6 refectories, 2 mobile teams, in addition to 33 job training workshops.

"Communicators are trying to find out through the people where the sign of hope is which develops as a huge comforting chain for those who are lonely and suffer."

"Skepticism made fail many societies. If it brings doubt or even ascertains that everything is going to be wrong, which will be the attitude of an adult facing his family, or a child's attitude towards learning", questioned Father Grassi.

"Those who have made up this skepticism -I'm sure they didn't do it on purpose- resemble the weed sowers mentioned in the Gospel."

"A man sowed splendorous wheat, but his enemies sowed weed over it, a seed resulting in a hulky scrub which covered the wheat and made it look as if it had disappeared."

"Could it be that sowing weed in communication, that is, publishing too many bad news could result in man viewing his neighbor in a manner very much alike to what is being communicated?"

"Communication is more objective when it shows both sides of the human life: the critical attitude and the hope-inspiring attitude which shows emotions of things running well."

"The media can also do business by showing the emotive side of the hope-inspiring, the nice and the good which blooms in a society which is moved and moves for those who suffer."

"We can sow much more solidarity, love and positive emotion in man by trying to take the initiative in communicating encouraging issues. By doing so the communicator will be succeeding fine. It's not a matter of living this suffering from the outside, but of turning around the negative and of seeing how we can start to vanquish it by sowing wheat although the weed still takes up much more bulk in the vision of man, and not in the physical space."

"Evil is lower and to the eyes of man takes up much more room, although in life the good is more important. There are more good and positive people around than those who work poorly."

"There are many people who suffer but there also are a large number who are contained by people who are like them or in the same conditions, but who have chosen to help them."

"Let us live a more operative solidarity, which shows itself like a burning lamp on a table. Let us not hide it under the table. God wants it to shine", finished Father Grassi.

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