HUMBUZZ - Pope Benedict XVI to Make Broadcasting History

PHOTO COURTESY OF: Catholic News Agency(HN, April 22, 2011) Pope Benedict XVI is to make broadcasting history today by becoming the first pontiff ever to take part in a televised question-and-answer session. 

The 80-minute pre-recorded program will air at 2:10pm local time on Italy's publicly-owned RAI Uno channel, in order for it to be on at 3pm when Jesus is traditionally thought to have taken his last breath, reports the Catholic news agency CNA.

More than 3,000 questions were submitted after the initiative was announced a month ago, of which seven were chosen and put to the 84-year-old pontiff.

RAI has been accepting questions for the show, titled In His Image - A Good Friday Special, that reflect issues and views from around the world. Out of all the over 3000 queries submitted from around the world, seven were chosen and put to the 84-year old pontiff.  Among them is a Muslim mother from the conflict-torn Ivory Coast in west Africa who wants to know more about Jesus as a teacher of peace. There’s also a question from seven Christian students from Baghdad, Iraq.

The RAI website indicates that viewers will hear the Pope answer "questions from an Italian mother whose son was in a coma for many years and a young Japanese girl who wrote to ask the pope to explain the cause of the recent earthquake in that country".

Broadcaster Rosario Carello's production team initially came up with the idea of a program in which viewers could ask questions about Jesus, and the Pope seemed the perfect person to answer them.

He said that the idea appeared "crazy" at first, but they saw "something in Pope Benedict's style that caused them to at least propose this idea to him". Carello added: "We proposed it and the Pope accepted." He describes the opportunity to see and hear Pope Benedict through the program as “extraordinary.”

Carello expressed his hope that the show will remind viewers of the significance of Good Friday, which he said has become "a day like any other for all the channels; there are even quarrels, idle gossip and things like that".

The special is expected to be rebroadcast by television networks around the world. 

-HUMNEWS Staff