John Boyle O'Reilly Memorial, Boston, by Daniel Chester French


The Pilot: A Restorationist's Lament

Once edited by the great John Boyle O'Reilly, The Pilot, now the official organ of the Boston Archdiocese, is the nation's oldest Catholic newspaper. But if the grapevine and the parlous state of the archdiocesan budget are any indication, the paper is not long for this world. And that is a shame.

The state to which the paper already has fallen is cause enough for regret. The Pilot had already come to be regarded by Lake Street as little more than a vehicle for the cardinal's weekly column by the time the previous editor, a monsignor, was recently dispatched for penning an editorial suggesting discussion on priestly celibacy. A young staff-writer whose politics were not in line was cashiered at the same time, for budget reasons, according to an archdiocesan PR spokeswoman with a six-figure salary.

Now The Pilot is edited by a Spanish émigré, Antonio Enrique, a devotee of a secretive sect, the Neocatechumenal Way (more links here), whose main qualification for the job appears to be a willingness to churn out editorials from the Lake Street bunker defending the cardinal while criticizing media coverage of the current crisis. The managing editor of the Archdiocese's Spanish-language monthly also is a member of the Neocatechumenal Way. Both editors emigrated with their families from Spain in 1996 at Cardinal Law's behest, to serve, according to The Pilot, as missionaries to the Latino community.

Why, one wonders, would Cardinal Law bring members of this sect over as homesteaders and set them to running the archdiocesan papers? Loyalty? A shared suspicion of American mainstream media?

If The Pilot does go under, how much would it cost to buy the name and set about operating – perhaps in an online version – the quality Catholic paper Boston deserves?