You’ll notice that our front page looks a little different this week. The yellow Post-It note at the top is designed to call your attention to a special envelope inserted into this edition encouraging our dear and faithful readers to please contribute to our annual Christmas Appeal. Your donation will go a long way toward ensuring Rhode Island Catholic’s continued financial stability — especially in such challenging times as we all are facing — and will help in our efforts to provide even more content in the year to come.
Diocesan newspapers, like our counterparts in the secular media, are businesses, and rely heavily on paid subscriptions and bountiful advertising in order to survive. Rhode Island Catholic is blessed to also receive a generous subsidy from the diocese in order to fund our operations. But these alone are not enough to keep the presses rolling on our venerable newspaper, which is entering its 147th year of bringing the local, national and international news of Faith, Family and Life literally to your doorstep each week.
While pandemic has only hastened the trend of large diocesan newspapers shuttering their longstanding print operations so that resources can be directed to other diocesan ministries, Rhode Island Catholic, with its multi-faceted business model and ability to adapt to these changing conditions, has remained strong in the face of such headwinds. We have also thrived, winning the most national and international Catholic Press awards in our history over the last two years alone for our coverage, and more than 100 awards overall in the last decade in tandem with our Spanish language edition El Católico de Rhode Island.
Bishop Thomas J. Tobin, publisher of Rhode Island Catholic, has said that the newspaper has a unique role in the evangelization efforts of the Diocese of Providence, featuring news and information about the Church from near and far, while also serving as a useful source of information for parishes, schools and organizations.
“Each week it provides important news and informed opinion about the Church — around the world, nationally and locally — that can be found nowhere else,” Bishop Tobin said.
Rhode Island Catholic’s ministry of ‘Bringing the Good News to Your Doorstep’ is made possible only through a strong partnership between the diocese and our readers. We are most grateful for any support that you can provide through a special gift to our Christmas Appeal and wish each of you and your families a Blessed Christmas and a very Happy New Year!
