The establishment of the CBCP News Service was approved by the Permanent Council of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippine (CBCP) during its regular meeting in November of 1997. The project was started in February 1998. Due to several constraints, it could not be pursued as envisioned.

In March 2006, the CBCP Media Office presented to the Permanent Council the plan to operationalize the CBCP News Service anew. On July 12, 2007, the CBCP News Service was finally launched at the CBCP Media Office led by then CBCP President, Archbishop Angel N. Lagdameo.

Mass Media have a very important role in shaping public opinion. Attributed as the first Areopagus of modern times, “It is the principal means of guidance and inspiration for many people in their personal, familial, and social behavior,” says the Encyclical Redemptoris Missio (Pope John Paul II, 1990).

In the Philippines where the Catholic Church plays a prophetic role in almost all aspects of life—which includes the social order—the communications media is doubly important.

The initiative of putting up a church media has become a necessity.

It is in this light that CBCPNews was established. It’s rationale is to set up “an alternative news organization staffed by Catholic journalists dedicated to providing accurate news written from a distinctively catholic perspective.”

The mission of CBCPNews is to help spread the Gospel through a standard level of journalism by re-telling in news reports and feature stories how the same Gospel is witnessed in the daily events and lives of the people.

In attention to the decrees of the Second Plenary Council of the Philippines, CBCPNews disposes itself to be at the service of the Episcopal Conference, dioceses and the catholic community in the use of the means of social communications “in order to attain a more organized thrust on evangelization, conscientization and formation of public opinion according to Gospel values.” (PCP-II, 102-105).

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