Al-Ahram Weekly 2 - 8 March 2000 Issue No. 471
Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875

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Covering the Pope

By Tarek Atia

On print and in pixels, across bandwidth and radio waves, the news we get every second of the day is orchestrated via a constantly evolving system that depends for its success on action and speed. This is especially important to note when it comes to coverage of religion; whether or not it plays a more important role in people's lives these days, the subject does seem to pop up a lot in the modern discourse of our increasingly "small" world.

Taking place 2,000 years after the birth of Christ, Pope John Paul II's three-day visit to Egypt, the first ever by the leader of the Roman Catholic church, was full of landmark events, providing a multitude of angles for the actors and image-makers to work with as they attempted to send their messages as far around the world as possible. Would the pilgrimage to Mount Sinai, where Moses received the Ten Commandments, the historic meeting at Al-Azhar, Islam's centre of learning, and the attempts to heal centuries-old rifts with other Christian churches survive the 1,000 cameras and the herd's desire to get a quote and run? For three days, all eyes around the world were focused on the Pope. But getting good publicity for all these symbolic events was no easy task. The media's specialty is not exactly good news. It has to be big, bad, or both to arouse the kind of frenzy we're talking about.

Would "the symbolism this trip carries, not just for Catholics but for the whole world", as Vatican spokesman Joaqu’n Navarro-Valls put it, "underscore the arrival of God in human history?" Most people would agree, at least, that he was absolutely right in one respect: "Seeing the Pope in this place makes the whole world think."

Just what they would think is another matter.

The drama started at the airport when the plane arrived, the flags of the Vatican and Egypt fluttering outside the cockpit windows. President Mubarak welcomed the Pope at the foot of the stairs. Four children presented him with a bowl filled with sand, which he kissed. He greeted ministers and religious leaders, walking slowly along the red carpet towards the airport's Presidential Lounge.

At the Coptic Cathedral in Abbassiya, gifts were exchanged. Pope Shenouda called Pope John Paul II a man of peace, politics and religion. The media concentrated more on the possibility of subtle snubs going either way. An hour later, the Pope was in Al-Azhar as a lead-up to his expected "apology to Muslims for the Crusades", which he is supposed to offer on 12 March, Request for Forgiveness Day. Sheikh of Al-Azhar Mohamed Sayed Tantawi called the Pope a "reasonable and wise man who calls for peace and love, morals and virtue". Gifts were exchanged.

These meetings have been months, years, perhaps centuries in the planning, and they're over in minutes.

Most of the press corps arrived at Al-Azhar's Mashyakha via back roads, in a rush. The Pope took the lift to the second floor for the meeting, which Father Greiche, who accompanied the Pope, described immediately afterwards as "an exchange of cultures between Christianity and Islam, an exchange of gifts: from Al-Azhar, the book 1,000 years of Al-Azhar, and from the Pope, the Bishara icon, a very nice icon."

As they walked towards the door, Sheikh Tantawi seemed attentive to the Pope's frailty. A second after the papal departure, the press descended upon Tantawi, clamouring for a statement. "What is the net result of the visit?" Microphones and TV cameras were shoved into his face.

His message of peace and dialogue was not quite what they wanted: a hundred voices were asking a different question the minute the Sheikh had finished answering the previous one. The hysteria showed a desperate desire for a meaty story; reality, in contrast, was annoyingly ethereal.

A case in point was the American woman at the airport, interviewing Reverend Safwat El-Bayadi, head of Egypt's Evangelical Church, just after the Pope arrived. El-Bayadi told her: "It is time to open the doors, open our understanding between churches, between East and West and between religions." The reporter nodded brusquely, and interjected an assertive, practiced "Is that because Islamic fundamentalism is on the rise?"

"I think there are more wise people than fundamentalists," the Reverend immediately responded.

"I see," she said, a self-satisfied smile playing on her lips.

"So this is our hope..." continued the Reverend. "That we can stand together, and know each other, and respect the differences of the other. I know that I am different from the Catholic church and the Orthodox church, but I respect our differences, there is some difference between Christianity and Islam, but we have to respect each other's differences. That's how we can..."

But the reporter was already packing away her microphone, clasping the Reverend's hand: "Thank you very much, I've got to go."

She would have to look elsewhere.

The next day, during the jam-packed mass at the stadium, there were just one or two perfect spots for the international TV crews' live feeds. They took turns at the prime spots, the announcers checking themselves out in mirrors, combing their hair, moving this way and that, while the service continued in the background. In the print media section, meanwhile, the reporters were tucked behind their desks like good Catholic-school students, diligently taking notes.

The next stop was Mount Sinai, the place where "God revealed his law", as the Pope, quoted endlessly, described it. Again, the signs of pilgrimage and publicity were all around. At the gateway of the St Catherine Monastery, a full-colour, larger-than-life wooden billboard in the robust likeness of John Paul II greeted the pilgrims. The clear blue sky and massive mountains gave the scene a timeless feel.

Christus Narrows, a Catholic Multi-national Force Observer stationed in Sinai, was unimpressed by the media hype: "I wish they would calm down," he said. "They make so much noise I can't even hear him speak."

After the Pope left, Joe Little, a veteran reporter for Irish Radio and TV, said: "The international press has looked for an angle of this story that might relate, for instance, to events in Nigeria over the past week. I think people are conscious of the need for good relations to be developed between Islam and Christianity."

The CNN on-line report was headlined "Pope, in Egypt, decries misuse of religion". The story's first line placed the words "Muslim-dominated Egypt" side by side with quotes from the Pope's speech about "misuse of religion", and "promulgate violence throughout history." As for the links on the right side of the page, the first was a "CNN look at the challenges faced by minority Coptic Christians". The Pope's visit to Israel will provide more opportunities for such knee-jerk reactions. Little acknowledges that "the international press are conditioned to look for stories involving Judaism and Islam, and the conflicts between Arabs and Jews".

ABC TV's on-line coverage began its story with the Pope's mention of the tension in Nigeria. The top "related" link was headlined "200 dead in Nigeria after religious fighting".

The AP feed that went to thousands of newspapers around the world made sure to mention that "among those gathered outside the monastery were many refugees from religious tension in neighbouring Sudan."

Little, however, thinks the media "are going away with a more subtle understanding of events. Certainly amongst my editors, there's an interest in the colourful variations of belief in your country, and I think that's been reflected in our reportage."

Then again, the Al-Azhar meeting, involving leaders of the two largest religious groups in the world, whose members make up two billion people, or over a third of the world's population, was not as extensively covered in the press as it might have been.

The Pope departed against a fitting backdrop: a beautiful but chilly sunset at the airport. It took a while for him to get out of the car, and the photographers began worrying about getting a good shot. It was getting dark quickly. After bidding farewell to a long line of ministers and religious figures, he exchanged a few words with Mubarak, then slowly climbed the stairs.

At the top, he turned around, waved, clasped his hands together, and waved again. As the plane took off, there was a collective sigh of relief.

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