Fr. Barron's "Catholicism" is "sectarian" and not airable according to Twin Cities Public Television

NCReg

Thank you for your email inquiring about the program Catholicism.

After careful review, tpt has declined to air the four-part series "Catholicism", produced by Word on Fire Catholic Ministries and Picture Show Films.

While the program is very well produced and interesting, it does not meet our long-standing requirement that programs carried by tpt be "non-commercial, non-partisan and non-sectarian".

This standard is applied to all tpt programs: those provided by PBS and those (like the "Catholicism" series) coming from a non-PBS source.

While our programming policy does permit programming about religion and religious issues, the 'non-sectarian' requirement means we generally do not carry programs that express only a single religious point of view, or assert matters of religious faith as fact.  [The pope living in Rome is a matter of religious faith an not fact apparently]

In addition, the stated purpose of the producer (Word on Fire Catholic Ministries) is to "reach millions of people to draw them into or back to the Catholic faith." While tpt recognizes the importance of programming that brings understanding and illumination to matters such as religion, we do not believe the evangelical nature of this series is consistent with our standards.

Thank you again, for your interest in our programming.

Tom Holter
Executive Director, Programming

details at Catholic Hotdish

MN Public TV blocking Fr. Barron's new "Catholicism" series

UPDATE: I received a direct response from TPT, which I’ve included at the bottom of this post. They’re going to “review” it, so please continue to contact them and show your interest in this series.

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The highly anticipated and groundbreaking televisions series, Catholicism, is coming to TV screens this Fall – except in the Twin Cities. TPT (Twin Cities Public Television) claims the program isn’t on their broadcast schedule. It’s scheduled on other public television stations nationwide, but why not this market? No one knows. Considering the Archdiocese of Saint Paul and Minneapolis has 750,000 members, I find it odd they wouldn’t want to air something so critically acclaimed and relevant to the largest demographic in the region.
Please contact the Twin Cities Public Television programming department at viewerservices@tpt.org and – politely – request they review their decision and bring this culturally important TV series to the people of the Twin Cities.

the rest at Catholic Hotdish