On Thursday, ZENIT Italian journalist Salvatore Cernuzio received the second prize of the “Youth” category, at the 2nd Annual “Giuseppe De Carli” Award for journalism. The article awarded was published last April and is entitled “Returning Dignity to Migrants Lost the Sands of the Desert.” The article recounts the Mass presided over by Cardinal Sean O’Malley in Arizona, for the 6,000 men, women and children who died on the border between the United States and Mexico.
The awards ceremony took place on Thursday afternoon in the “Saint Bonaventure” – Seraphicum Pontifical Faculty of Theology, next to the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross. The pontifical university is an academic member of the “Giuseppe De Carli” Association, promoter of the Award which was instituted in honor of the renowned Vatican expert and founder of Rai-Vatican.
The three winners were Daniele Bellocchio of ‘L’Expresso,” in the Youth category; Aldo Maria Valli of Tg1 RAI, in the “video” category; and Andrea Tornielli of “La Stampa,” in the “written text” category.
The winners were given a personalized silver medal, which the Association had made, to “unite those awarded to the name and professionalism of Giuseppe De Carli, with the desire for a career dedicated to the teaching of the values that characterized his service to truth.”
The event began with a round table moderated by Vincenzo Morgante, Director of TGR Rai, and attended by Archbishop Rino Fisichella, President of the Pontifical Council for Promoting the New Evangelization; Spanish journalist Paloma Garcia Ovejero, correspondent of COPE radio, and Vatican expert Gian Guido Vecchi of “Corriere della Sera.
Archbishop Fisichella spoke to those present about communication and the New Evangelization, and he offered a vision of what the Church expects from journalists. He specified that the Vatican correspondent does not improvise, as one never improvises in life.” Moreover, he said that a journalist can be presented as a name and means of communication for one who works in the field, “The name is united to the means. That is a reference,” he said. However, he clarified, the journalist’s name refers particularly to his professionalism. And professionalism is characterized “by the capacity to be able to express one’s preparation, one’s vocation in coherence with what has been their participation in that mission.” The President of the President of the Pontifical Council for Promoting the New Evangelization also said that truth needs research, truth needs sincerity.”
Concluding his address, the archbsihop gave advice on the importance of silence, affirming that “silence is at the origin of all language and is in the conclusion of every language.” And, he added, ”if one doesn’t reflect, one cannot write.”
For her part, Spanish journalist Paloma Garcia Ovejero gave her experience on how to report news on the Vatican outside of Italy. She said that in her two years of experience in Rome she has realized the difference between Spain and Italy when it comes to news on the Pope, the Vatican and the Church, noting that in Spain there is not the specific Vatican expert role. To work and to help one’s audience to understand how the Vatican works is part of the day in day out. And she offered a key for doing one’s work – something that the Pope does very well: “use simple images to explain profound things.” Another bit of advice was that, “behind 40 seconds of well prepared news are 40 hours of study and silence.” Finally, she stressed the importance of always looking for the source and the truth.
Gian Guido Vecchi ended the event by reflecting on how to discern whether something is newsworthy. In the first place, he said, “good news does not pass necessarily through newspapers,” and that, in general, what “makes news is the extraordinary.” In this connection, he added that good news makes the headlines when it is perceived as genuine.
