According to my count, there are 235 radio stations carrying mostly 24 hour a day EWTN (the audio of the cable TV channel featuring the deceased Mother Angelica). Pope John Paul II urged lay groups to buy or start radio stations, and the sheep flocked to please Rome.<\/p>\n
Some of you may remember Charlotte was the home of PTL Club which had a Cable TV evangelization organization. At the time, there was tension between PTL and brick and mortar churches. While they were playing for the same team, dollars sent to buy Tammy Faye Bakker more jewelry was money vanishing from local offering plates, and people felt it was less necessary to go to Church on Sunday since they had 15 hours of preaching during the week.<\/p>\n
I have the sense a similar dynamic is at work within the Catholic Radio business. Local dioceses rally to buy a radio station, have the Bishop sprinkle the transmitter with holy water and praise Mary for their blessings – but have absolutely no idea what to do with a radio station or how to run it. So it runs 24 hrs a day with EWTN for the 3 people listening to it. Maybe they air the local mass from a recording.<\/p>\n
Two of the big operators who actually know what they are doing are merging – California based Immaculate Heart Radio<\/a> and Midwest based Relevant Radio<\/a>. The $30 million cost of the Merger is mostly coming from one man from Hinsdale, Illinois. Michael Birck<\/a> made his money from AT&T and died about a year ago.<\/a>. Once the merger is complete, the combined Relevant radio will have a bit over 100 stations.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" According to my count, there are 235 radio stations carrying mostly 24 hour a day EWTN (the audio of the cable TV channel featuring the deceased Mother Angelica). Pope John Paul II urged lay groups to buy or start radio … Continue reading