{"id":3056,"date":"2008-07-10T11:15:00","date_gmt":"2008-07-10T11:15:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/deaconsbench\/2008\/07\/russert-understood-what-it-meant-to-be-called-to-be-a-catholic.html"},"modified":"2008-07-10T11:15:00","modified_gmt":"2008-07-10T11:15:00","slug":"russert-understood-what-it-meant-to-be-called-to-be-a-catholic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/2008\/07\/russert-understood-what-it-meant-to-be-called-to-be-a-catholic.html","title":{"rendered":"Russert &#8220;understood what it meant to be &#8216;called&#8217; to be a Catholic&#8221;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Not much has been written about the big event that followed by several days the death of Tim Russert: the lecture for the Catholic Common Ground Initiative, which the NBC News star was scheduled to give.  His last-minute replacement was another NBC News star, and Catholic &#8212; a graduate of Catholic University, in fact &#8212; Brian Williams.     <\/p>\n<p>But now there&#8217;s an account that&#8217;s been published <a href=\"http:\/\/www.getreligion.org\/?p=3692\">online<\/a>, and it helps to put Russert&#8217;s life and work (and faith) in context: <\/p>\n<blockquote><p> Williams said that the key question for the night could be stated this way: Was Russert\u2019s relentless search for the truth a result of his Catholic upbringing?<\/p>\n<p>In a moment that could have produced an entire forum, event or book, Williams briefly discussed Russert\u2019s internal struggle during the waves of clergy sex-abuse scandals that rocked his church. Trying to handle that horrific reality \u2014 as a Catholic parent and as a journalist \u2014 was a test of Russert\u2019s faith. But, Williams said, he also knew that he needed to do the \u201cjob of a journalist.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Russert always \u201cunderstood that the stakes were high. He knew that better than most of us,\u201d added Williams. \u201cHe knew that the civility of our dialogue was under attack. He knew that diversity in the public square takes work every day. And he knew that our standards of journalism were being attacked. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cHe understood what it meant to be \u2018called\u2019 to be Catholic, and I think that\u2019s very important. He took the call.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p> Visit <a href=\"http:\/\/www.getreligion.org\/?p=3692\">GetReligion.org<\/a> for that and much more.  Great stuff.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Not much has been written about the big event that followed by several days the death of Tim Russert: the lecture for the Catholic Common Ground Initiative, which the NBC News star was scheduled to give. His last-minute replacement was another NBC News star, and Catholic &#8212; a graduate of Catholic University, in fact &#8212;&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":204,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19,11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3056","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-links-r-us","category-media"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Russert &quot;understood what it meant to be &#039;called&#039; to be a Catholic&quot; - The Deacon&#039;s Bench<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/2008\/07\/russert-understood-what-it-meant-to-be-called-to-be-a-catholic.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Russert &quot;understood what it meant to be &#039;called&#039; to be a Catholic&quot; - The Deacon&#039;s Bench\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Not much has been written about the big event that followed by several days the death of Tim Russert: the lecture for the Catholic Common Ground Initiative, which the NBC News star was scheduled to give. His last-minute replacement was another NBC News star, and Catholic &#8212; a graduate of Catholic University, in fact &#8212;&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/2008\/07\/russert-understood-what-it-meant-to-be-called-to-be-a-catholic.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"The Deacon&#039;s Bench\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2008-07-10T11:15:00+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Deacon Greg Kandra\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Russert \"understood what it meant to be 'called' to be a Catholic\" - The Deacon&#039;s Bench","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/2008\/07\/russert-understood-what-it-meant-to-be-called-to-be-a-catholic.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Russert \"understood what it meant to be 'called' to be a Catholic\" - The Deacon&#039;s Bench","og_description":"Not much has been written about the big event that followed by several days the death of Tim Russert: the lecture for the Catholic Common Ground Initiative, which the NBC News star was scheduled to give. His last-minute replacement was another NBC News star, and Catholic &#8212; a graduate of Catholic University, in fact &#8212;&hellip;","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/2008\/07\/russert-understood-what-it-meant-to-be-called-to-be-a-catholic.html","og_site_name":"The Deacon&#039;s Bench","article_published_time":"2008-07-10T11:15:00+00:00","author":"Deacon Greg Kandra","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/2008\/07\/russert-understood-what-it-meant-to-be-called-to-be-a-catholic.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/2008\/07\/russert-understood-what-it-meant-to-be-called-to-be-a-catholic.html","name":"Russert \"understood what it meant to be 'called' to be a Catholic\" - The Deacon&#039;s Bench","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/#website"},"datePublished":"2008-07-10T11:15:00+00:00","dateModified":"2008-07-10T11:15:00+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/#\/schema\/person\/5a7b3c6e9d155e382842aa310ff9b1ee"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/2008\/07\/russert-understood-what-it-meant-to-be-called-to-be-a-catholic.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/2008\/07\/russert-understood-what-it-meant-to-be-called-to-be-a-catholic.html"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/2008\/07\/russert-understood-what-it-meant-to-be-called-to-be-a-catholic.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Russert &#8220;understood what it meant to be &#8216;called&#8217; to be a Catholic&#8221;"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/","name":"The Deacon&#039;s Bench","description":"Where a Roman Catholic Deacon Ponders the World","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/#\/schema\/person\/5a7b3c6e9d155e382842aa310ff9b1ee","name":"Deacon Greg Kandra","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/114\/1144d939be636f641ea021e1d347f9fdx96.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/114\/1144d939be636f641ea021e1d347f9fdx96.jpg","caption":"Deacon Greg Kandra"},"description":"A Roman Catholic deacon serving the Diocese of Brooklyn, New York, Greg Kandra is News Director for the diocese's cable channel, NET (New Evangelization Television.) Prior to that, Deacon Greg worked for 26 years as a writer and producer for CBS News, where he contributed to \"The CBS Evening News with Katie Couric,\" \"60 Minutes II,\" \"48 Hours,\" (Emmy Award, Writers Guild of America Award) and \"Sunday Morning.\" He was co-writer for the acclaimed documentary \"9\/11,\" hosted by Robert DeNiro. (Emmy Award, Christopher Award, Peabody Award, Writers Guild of America Award.) His radio essays were featured in the bestselling book \"Deadlines and Datelines\" by Dan Rather. He's also a two-time winner of the Catholic Press Association Award. Other places you may find him: AMERICA, U.S. CATHOLIC, CATHOLIC DIGEST, REALITY (Redemptorist Communications) and THE BROOKLYN TABLET. He also contributes homiletic reflections to the parish resource CONNECT!, published by Liturgical Publications. In November 2009, he began serving a three-year term as a consultant to the Communications Committee of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB). Deacon Greg grew up in Maryland (Go Terps!) but he and his wife today live in the beautiful borough of Queens, New York. You can contact Deacon Greg at dcngreg@gmail.com.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/author\/gkandra"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3056","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/204"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3056"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3056\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3056"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3056"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3056"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}