Pope speaks of role of media in promoting understanding

Pope Benedict spoke about the role of the media in promoting understanding between people, after praying the Angelus with pilgrims in St Peter's Square yesterday, the 39th World Day of Social Communications. Pope Benedict noted that the theme chosen last year by Pope John Paul for this occasion was "The Communications Media: At the Service of Understanding Between Peoples." He said that, "in the current era of images, the mass media are effectively an extraordinary resource in promoting solidarity and understanding in the human family. We recently had extraordinary proof of this on the occasion of the death and solemn funeral of my beloved predecessor John Paul II. But he said: "everything depends, however, on the way they are used. These important instruments of communications can promote reciprocal knowledge and dialogue or, on the contrary, feed prejudice and disdain among individuals and peoples: they can contribute to spreading peace or to fomenting violence. This is why personal responsibility is always important: it is necessary for everyone to do their part to assure, in every form of communications, objectivity, respect for human dignity and attention to the common good. In such a way this contributes to knocking down the walls of hostility that still divide mankind and to consolidating those bonds of friendship and love that are signs of the Kingdom of God in history." Source VIS