To all in our blogging community, we extend the invitation to listen to our weekly radio program American Catholic Radio. You can listen online at http://franciscanmedia.org or find our program broadcast in your local community. We’re featured on Sirius/XM 129 (The Catholic Channel), the Relevant Radio network, Radio Maria and many other religious, public and commercial stations in the U.S. Father Greg Friedman, O.F.M., writes a bi-weekly newsletter about the show. Here is his entry reviewing what you’ll be listening to this week:
With this month’s episodes of American Catholic Radio, Sister Rose Pacatte of the Daughters of St. Paul (Paulines) joins us to present our new “On Faith and Media” feature. She lives in Los Angeles—more specifically, Culver City, near the LAX airport and not far from famed Venice Beach.
The Daughters of St. Paul are known worldwide for their study of today’s media, especially how print, film and electronic communications may be avenues to God. (You can learn more about their mission at http://www.pauline.org/.)
Sister Rose, a specialist in media education, earned an M.A. in media studies (University of London, United Kingdom) and has a diploma in catechetics and a certificate in pastoral communications (University of Dayton, where she has taught in its Institute for Pastoral Studies). She directs a special media center in Culver City, located with the Paulines’ resource center there, where thousands from the L.A. area shop for Catholic books and media, and also pray with the sisters in their chapel. The media center offers courses and retreats grounded in media education.
Sister Rose is a frequent presence in motion picture circles in Hollywood and beyond. She regularly attends film screenings and talks with producers, directors, writers, actors and others in the film industry about their work and spirituality. She has served on international juries at film festivals and has visited many parts of the world in her work as a movie reviewer and media educator. She numbers among her friends Oscar-winning producers and directors, and has won numerous awards herself.
Readers of St. Anthony Messenger have known Sister Rose for a number of years as its movie and television reviewer. She does not shy away from any media that might lead us to think more deeply and perhaps gain a new perspective on faith—even when the media might be controversial for language or content.
I have been blessed to know Sister Rose as a longtime friend in Catholic media. We share a love for movies and have given retreats together, centered on films and faith.
It’s been my great joy to be the guest of her Pauline Sisters in Boston and L.A. They are a community which keeps up on all forms of media, and their gift is to interpret media in the light of our faith. Typically, I’ll call Sister Rose when I’ve seen some recent film, only to catch her on her way to a Hollywood screening! We don’t always agree on what we like, but we do appreciate the dedication of so many people in the movie industry who search for the truth through their art.
I know you’ll find your media horizons broadened by Sister Rose and her contribution to ACR and to our whole family of resources here at St. Anthony Messenger Press. And she’s promised to team up with me from time to time for a feature we’ll call “A Priest and Nun Go to the Movies.” Welcome, Sister Rose!
–Father Greg Friedman, O.F.M.
Matt is Manager of the Media Production Department at St. Anthony Messenger. He serves as Executive Producer on audio and video products produced for St. Anthony Messenger, Servant Books and Franciscan Media. blog comments powered by 
Fr. Christopher G. Phillips is the pastor of Our Lady of the Atonement Catholic Church in San Antonio, Texas, where he has served for the past twenty-seven years. He is the founding pastor of the first Anglican Use parish, erected in 1983 under the terms of the Pastoral Provision. Fr. Phillips was ordained as an Anglican for the Diocese of Bristol, England, in 1975. After serving as Curate for three years at St. Stephen Southmead, he returned to the United States and served in two Episcopal parishes in the Diocese of Rhode Island. In 1981 he left the Episcopal Church and moved with his family to Texas, where he was subsequently ordained as a Catholic priest in 1983. Fr. Phillips and his wife, JoAnn, have been married for forty years. They have five children, all grown and married, and two grandchildren.