Re: Two Solitudes; Lawsuit Pits Rebel Quebec Priest Against Hardline Pro-life News Service, Graeme Hamilton, March 5.
This article reported that among the passages for which Raymond Gravel is suing LifeSiteNews was one calling him a “so-called priest who supports abortion.” In fact, that statement was contained in a letter to the editor on the website. LifeSiteNews publishes letters with a variety of views, including those from our critics of our stories.
The article made it seem as though LifeSiteNews itself was responsible for this statement. That would be the same as the National Post being blamed for anti-Semitism or other objectional views published in its letters section.
The story included extensive comments from Father Gravel himself and from our most severe critic in the Catholic Church, Father Thomas Rosica. Completely missing from the article was the fair and balanced inclusion of any comments from the numerous supportive Catholic clergy and other readers of LifeSiteNews. This was especially important considering that I was at a disadvantage in not being able to discuss details of the case because our defence document has not yet been presented to the court.
As for LifeSiteNews being one of two “extremes” on the issues that it covers related to Catholic Church teachings, I challenge anyone to find in any of our articles since our beginning in 1997 anything that would indicate LifeSiteNews supports any actions or ideas that contradict Church teachings on those issues. If giving preference to complete fidelity to authentic Catholic moral teachings is considered to be “extreme”, then perhaps we are guilty of that creative definition of the word.
John-Henry Westen, co-founder and editor-in-chief, LifeSiteNews.com.