Signs first pilot, funding for mission archives
Everything was ready for an exceptional seminar in Prague. The meeting was going to be hosted in the auditorium of the Cardinal's palace. The Cardinal himself was supposed to open the seminar. Again the number of participants was increasing. But at the end of March, Pope John Paul II went to hospital and died on the 2nd of April.
A large number of the registered participants being in charge of religious programmes had to cover the events, the ceremonies in Rome, the funeral. The Cardinal was called to Rome. Eighteen participants still joined the seminar.
Peter Thomas presented the first pilot of the SIGNS Magazine, realized with the collaboration of Sat2000. Participants made some suggestions. Those who had contributed to the magazine offered to take the suggestions into account and to produce a second pilot. Peter Thomas took the responsibility to coordinate this second pilot.
The proposal of a series of cartoons on European fairy tales had not been presented in due time and according to the rules of the European Commission. It was too difficult to face all administrative difficulties for the first experience of such an international collaborative work.
The project about photographic and cinematographic archives from the missionaries was in better state. Some German funding agencies were ready to finance part of the costs for the collection of material and the digitalization.
Exchanges of programmes and resources between participants was another result of the previous seminars so that the feeling of building a community of interests and services was more and more shared by all Catholic TV/producers.
In Prague, Msgr Planas, the representative of the Pontifical Council for Social Communications, surprisingly announced that the Council was going to organize a World Congress of Catholic Television, in Madrid. One of the purposes was to give a clear definition of what is a 'Catholic television'. Other purposes were to build a data bank of programmes offered free of charge to all Catholic television stations. The announcement was followed by reactions from the participants. Was it possible and to be desired to fix a definition of what is really 'Catholic television' considering the great variety of initiatives, institutions, contexts? Some producers found it unjust to organize a bank of programmes offered free of charge to the Catholic television stations. A production has a cost that has to be covered.
The fact that SIGNIS was invited to contribute to the organization of the Congress spoke in favour of the idea of organizing in 2006 the TV/Producers' seminar in Madrid, a few days before the Congress.
