National Catholic Reporter

Criticism

In April 1967, NCR published confidential reports of a commission appointed by Pope Paul VI to review the church's teaching on artificial contraception. The majority of the commission recommended revisions to the teaching. The action was among the reasons Bishop Charles H. Helmsing of Kansas City, Missouri, in 1968, issued a condemnation of NCR and demanded that it remove the word Catholic from its name. Bishop Helmsing issued a statement condemning NCR, saying it had a "policy of crusading against the Church's teachings", a "poisonous character" and "disregard and denial of the most sacred values of our Catholic faith." Because the publication "does not reflect the teaching of the Church, but on the contrary, has openly and deliberately opposed this teaching", he asked the editors to "drop the term 'Catholic' from their masthead" because "they deceive their Catholic readers and do a great disservice to ecumenism by [...] watering down Catholic teachings."

NCR did not comply with his request. Dozens of Catholic journalists would sign a statement disagreeing with the condemnation, citing its "underlying definition of the legitimate boundaries of religious journalism in service to the church." The Catholic Press Association reported that the dispute arose from a difference of opinion regarding the function of the press.

In 2013, Bishop Robert Finn of Kansas City, Missouri, wrote a column in his diocesan newspaper discussing Helmsing's condemnation of NCR. He stated, "From my perspective, NCR's positions against authentic Church teaching and leadership have not changed trajectory in the intervening decades." Finn wrote that the paper had refused to "submit their bona fides as a Catholic media outlet in accord with the expectations of Church law", and considered itself an "independent newspaper which commented on 'things Catholic'."

NCR publisher Thomas C. Fox denied the implication that there was a decades-long animosity between the diocese and the newspaper, noting that Bishop John Sullivan and Bishop Raymond Boland "had cordial relations with NCR". He pointed out that NCR is a member of the Catholic Press Association of the United States and Canada, whose honorary president is Bishop John Charles Wester, who also serves as the chairman of the Committee of Communications of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. Fox noted an NCR editorial in November 2012 had called on Finn to resign or be removed from his position after Finn was found guilty "of failing to report suspected child abuse involving a local priest." Finn resigned from the Diocese of Kansas City on April 21, 2015, after an internal Vatican investigation.