Catholic radio, TV draw large senior audience
Programs with daily Mass, news and entertainment foster a sense of Catholic community for older adult viewers and listeners
By Maryann Gogniat Eidemiller - OSV Newsweekly, 6/12/2011
John Elson’s grandmother used to watch daily Mass on television every morning, and it was a very special time for her.
“It allowed her to begin her day with the Lord and to have that spiritual community with our Lord,” he said. “Watching the daily Mass allowed her to be a vital member of the body of Christ.”
Elson has more than a personal interest in the joy that Catholic television brought to his late grandmother’s life. He is director of program acquisitions and coproductions at EWTN-TV, the Eternal Word Television Network based in Irondale, Ala.
EWTN operates 24/7 on more than 4,800 cable and satellite stations in 144 countries and reaches 148 million homes. Many viewers are senior citizens, a niche audience that has a special interest in programming geared to its generation.
“We have shows that the older audience really appreciates,” Elson told Our Sunday Visitor. “There’s the whole genre of teaching programs, and one of the top series is [Archbishop Fulton Sheen’s] ‘Life Is Worth Living.’ Many of our viewers grew up watching that show, so it resonates very well with them.”
Seniors also enjoy “Blessings of Aging,” which covers relevant issues, such as a segment on the truth about euthanasia. A nostalgic series features Hollywood legends James Cagney, Loretta Young and Christopher Plummer.
“They are values-oriented shows that really bring very positive views,” Elson said.
Audience feedback initiated two programs in the making. One has Ray Guarendi, a Catholic psychologist and author who is popular in Catholic and secular media.
“One segment is geared toward answering questions seniors have,” said Peter Gagnon, director of programming and production. “It will cover things like being involved in the parish or children who have left the Church.”
The studio is currently filming Father Roger Landry and Dr. Vincent Fortanasce in “Remembering Jesus.” It will debut in March 2012.
“It’s specifically about Alzheimer’s disease, how it affects you and how it affects those around you,” Gagnon said. “It will be about people who are caregivers now and about people who have the disease but are still cognitively available.”
Older viewers also identify with the series with author and psychologist Father Benedict Groeschel and Catholic philosopher and author Alice von Hildebrand. They discuss suffering, growing older, the spiritual response to suffering and the link to Christ’s suffering on the cross.
“We get a lot of thank-you notes for our devotional programs, for the Mass, rosaries and chaplets that we have daily and that allow seniors to participate in the life of the Church from their homes, nursing homes or hospitals,” Gagnon said. “Sometimes seniors feel left out, but they are vital members in the Church. We want to encourage them to participate, even it’s just praying, offering up their suffering or being on parish council.”
Lifeline to spiritual life
Surveys indicate that more than half of Immaculate Heart Radio’s listeners are older than 50, and nearly half of those are older than 60.
“Some of our most popular programs are the Mass and the Rosary, which are especially helpful to seniors who are shut-ins,” said Tom Huckins, director of stations development. “They love to say their prayers along with the listening audience. We get a lot of folks telling us how much that means to them and that it’s a lifeline to their spiritual life.”
Immaculate Heart Radio originates in Loomis, Calif., and broadcasts programming from various sources.
Huckins calls broadcast media “the best form of catechesis available today.”
“People are learning their faith for the first time, and even people who have been in the Church for a long time let us know that they are finally understanding the Church,” he said.
The Catholic Television Network of Youngstown, operated by the Diocese of Youngstown, Ohio, broadcasts a Sunday Mass that’s taped earlier in the week at the studio chapel. Various priests from the diocese celebrate the liturgy.
“We show only the altar and the ambo, so it’s like we have turned their living rooms into their pews,” producer and director Bob Gavalier said.
CTNY sends missalettes to those who request them and also provides them to nursing homes so that viewers can follow along with the Mass.
KNXT-TV is owned and operated by the Diocese of Fresno, Calif., and is broadcast on cable and digital outlets. The worldwide stream reaches about 84 countries. Because it is public television, scheduling includes community service programs like “Forum For A Better Understanding.”
According to webmaster and program assistant Kue Lee, a segment in which religious community leaders discussed a Florida pastor’s intentions to burn the Quran caught a lot of attention.“It was very time sensitive,” Lee said.
KNXT-TV also broadcasts PBS’s “California Gold,” hosted by Huell Howser, who goes around California talking about history and people.
“It has a pretty big following, especially a lot of seniors,” Lee said.
Older viewers also like “The Golden Age of Television,” featuring a Groucho Marx game show from the 1940s and 1950s. Another favorite is “Classic Cinema with Father Ricardo.” In that, Father Ricardo Magdaleno, an avid movie fan, hosts classic films and presents comments and trivia during breaks.
KNXT-TV broadcasts Bishop Sheen episodes, devotionals and daily Mass from EWTN. The station also produces Sunday Masses in English, Spanish and Portuguese.
CatholicTV.com, based in Watertown, Mass., broadcasts on cable and the Internet. “We have a locally produced program that’s not specifically for the elderly, but I would say that we get the most response from it from older viewers,” said Bonnie Rodgers, who is responsible for programming. Senior viewers like devotionals and “anything with the pope.” They even report that they like the children’s shows.
The “Going My Way” program has a format like a late-night television variety and comedy show. Rodgers calls it a “21st-century version of ‘The Merv Griffin Show.’” Father Chris Hickey is host with co-host Father Paul Rouse, his mentor-turned-sidekick. Father Rouse, who is retired from the Archdiocese of Boston, plays the piano for Father Hickey and other talented singing priests from the archdiocese and beyond.
“Father Hickey is young, but he loves the old songs,” Rodgers said. “We do hear from the young and old, but the elderly call in with song requests. They talk about it at senior community centers and they come together to watch it.”
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Israeli Jew turned Catholic priest named head of papal court
David Maria Jaeger, a native of downtown Tel Aviv who converted to Catholicism, will become a prelate auditors of the Roman Rota, one of the chief papal law courts of the Catholic church.
ByTomer Zarchin
www.haaretz.com/…/israeli-jew-tur…,

David Maria Jaeger, a Catholic priest who converted from Judaism, will be installed this morning as a prelate auditor of the Roman Rota, a papal law court that serves as the chief appellate court of the Catholic Church.
Jaeger has come a long way from his youth in downtown Tel Aviv. He attended Bilu Elementary School, at that time a school for Tel Aviv's religious Zionist bourgeoisie, studied at the Zeitlin religious high school and from there, went all the way to the Holy See's highest court.
His sister Leah flew in from Israel yesterday morning for the event, bringing a special sculpture made especially for the new auditor by Menashe Kadishman. The artist hammered out the image of Jesus on the cross, with his head on the upper edge of the cross and his hands bound to its sides.
Attorney Chaim Stanger, a close friend of Jaeger's from their days together at Bilu, was also invited, but will be unable to attend because he has been under house arrest for the last few months.
Jaeger's appointment to the Holy See's highest judicial body - comprising 20 auditors hand-picked by the pope and headed by Dean of the Rota Antoni Stankiewicz - is considered a personal sign of appreciation by the pope for Jaeger's years as legal adviser to the delegation that negotiated the Vatican's Fundamental Agreement with Israel. This pact, signed in 1993, enabled the establishment of diplomatic relations between the parties the following year.
Jaeger, 56, was born in Tel Aviv to Gershon, a legendary history teacher at the Ironi A High School, and Dvora, who served as Brazil's deputy consul in Israel.
"He was a genius, physically large, an intellectual at a young age," Stanger said. "He spoke unusually maturely for his age. And children abused and hurt him."
As a teenager, Stanger continued, "Jaeger disappeared for six years." When he returned, at 22, he met Stanger and told him, "You know, I'm now in the church."
"I have a black hole regarding the period between the ages of 16 and 22," Stanger said. "He returned a doctor of theology and never spoke of the process he underwent. He told me, 'Chaim, when the time comes, we'll talk.'"
In the 1980s, Stanger came to his friend's aid, defending him in a report that Channel 1 television did about Jaeger. Rabbi Shlomo Goren, at whose north Tel Aviv synagogue Jaeger's father prayed, had attacked the younger Jaeger, terming him a meshumad - a derogatory word for someone who converts away from Judaism that literally means "destroyed."
Jaeger asked Stanger to defend him, and the latter told Channel 1, "A person cannot be wiped out, his soul cannot be killed."
Stanger noted that Jaeger's father acted "as if he didn't know his son had converted to Christianity, because as I understood it, this wasn't something they spoke about. But he was loved by both his parents; his mother also gave him support and love."
Another person who became Jaeger's friend is Prof. Arie Nadler, a former dean of Tel Aviv University's School of Social Sciences. The two met several years ago at a university symposium on the subject of prejudice.
"He came dressed as a Franciscan priest, but he was immediately familiar to me," Nadler said yesterday. "He looked just like his father, who was my admired history teacher at Ironi A and a significant and special figure in my life. He began to tell us about himself, and it was very exciting to me. We met several times, in Rome as well, and we became friends.
"He is a special man," Nadler continued. "He's told me about his deep ties to Israel. We didn't delve deeply into the reasons for his Christianity. He only gave hints."
When Jaeger was asked yesterday whether he feels Israeli, he replied, "at least as much as you do," adding, "I'm just like any Israeli citizen who works for an international organization situated outside the country - just like there are Israelis at the International Monetary Fund in Washington, the UN in New York or UNESCO in Paris. I am in a supra-national international body, that's the only the difference."
"I'm a loyal and patriotic son of our people and our country," he said. "After all, that was the whole point of the Jewish people's emancipation in the 19th century, that we would become a nation, not a religious minority among gentiles. A person can live according to his conscience, he can not believe in any religious faith or believe in one rather than another, all according to his own intellectual conscience."
Jaeger held two important positions en route to this appointment: legal adviser to the Holy See in the negotiations with Israel and, in the 1990s, head of the Diocesan court of Austin, Texas, which rules on issues of canon law such as marriage annulments.
Over the past two decades, he has divided his time among Israel, Rome and the United States. He will hold his new post until age 75.