In a message to SIGNIS, the World Catholic Association for Communication, Pope Francis warned against serious ethical issues that can stem from social media. He said that “sometimes and in some places, media sites have become places of toxicity, hate speech and fake news.”
The Pope denounced fake news as an ethical issues that can hurt innocent people in one of his homilies at Casa Santa Marta in 2020.
POPE FRANCIS
There is the small daily lynching that tries to condemn people, to create a bad reputation of people, to discard them, to condemn them. It's the small daily lynching of gossip, which creates opinions. So many times, one hears people speaking badly about others.
One piece of fake news was released last week announcing the death of Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI.
The Pope believes Catholic communication can play an important role in combatting fake news by teaching people how to distinguish the truth from disinformation.
KG
