From Trinity Retreat — 11/7/04

On the first night when my new live television call-in show appeared on EWTN (7:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. ET), we discovered that it did not air in our own area of Westchester County. In its place was the dumbest town meeting I’d ever seen in my life. Many people were quite upset about this, and I called a few live wires, who went to work. Hundreds of people were mobilized, petitions were drawn up, e-mails were sent, and personal letters were mailed to the president of the cable corporation by stockholders. By the following Sunday white flags were flying, and the program aired in Westchester.
There is something to learn here. Many people complain that they don’t get EWTN on television full-time, and there is no reason for this. EWTN gives its signal for nothing, so it doesn’t cost cable companies a penny to carry the network. Most cable companies have several empty channels. The company we were dealing with showed the same town meeting on three different channels, so it was three times as dull.
If there is some underlying reason that people do this, I cannot say. I do know that a group of clients who let the cable company know that within the next two months they are going to cancel their subscription will be heard. All you have to do is unite and be persistent.
There is every reason why EWTN, which presents fine Catholic programming, should be on. Immense numbers of people watch EWTN who are not Catholics or even Christians. It gets fine reviews and very good ratings. Why isn’t it on more? Who knows? I would not simply assume that the reason is always anti-Catholic prejudice, but you could wonder. It often is preoccupation of the people in the studio, or running the cable network with other details.
E-mail and letters will get their attention, especially if many people write and all sing the same song: EWTN or we quit. Somebody had said strike them in the pocketbook and they will be moved.
All of this is said with malice toward none. I’m grateful to the cable system for extending its time and making its channel available for my program. I didn’t write any letters, because I don’t have a cable channel, but many, many people do and appreciate our program. I’m grateful to God for them, and I’m also grateful to anyone who runs a cable network for putting on EWTN, which is sane, sensible, respectable religious broadcasting in a wasteland. The monks of old knew that God would bless them when they took over wasteland and marshes to make it into a farm. Now I think we have to do the same thing with television and cable.
— Father Benedict J. Groeschel, C.F.R.
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