Jonathan Liedl never planned a career in journalism. After all, his undergraduate degree from the University of Notre Dame is in political science and Arabic studies.
Well, he was involved in the Pequot Lakes High School newspaper and contributed to a newspaper at Notre Dame (“the Irish Rover”) that covered what’s happening at the university from a Catholic perspective, he said. And he has written columns for The Catholic Spirit since 2019.
Jonathan Liedl
Liedl, who lives in the Twin Cities, recently was named senior editor of the National Catholic Register newspaper, and described his journey to that position and Catholic journalism during a “Practicing Catholic” radio show interview with host Patrick Conley.
“I think it’s really just the story of God’s providence and different things opening up, and … the needs of the world and the Church, and also the gifts God has given me … aligning in different ways,” he said.
God seems to draw him back to doing journalism for the Church, Leidl said, both covering what’s happening in the Church and “with that Catholic vision,” looking to what’s happening in the world, he said. “So that’s what I try to do.”
Liedl’s background includes working with the Minnesota Catholic Conference and three years of seminary formation. Besides his bachelor’s degree, he has a master’s degree in Catholic Studies from the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul and is currently completing a master’s degree in theology at The St. Paul Seminary.
Catholic publications fail when they write stories only to generate clicks, Liedl said. Catholic media need to have a catechetical mission, he said, to inform people, to help educate them in the heart and the mind of the Church.
“The goal should be always bringing people into a kind of fuller life with the teachings of the Church, with the community of the Church,” he said.
Liedl believes humility allowed him to say “trust that God has led you here, trust that he’ll continue to provide for you, and you can make judgments on how to cover certain things.”
Humility is the most important virtue to have “probably in all of life,” he said, “but definitely in an arena where you’re publishing ideas that other people are reading and you’re really informing the way other people see reality,” he said.
To learn more about the National Catholic Register, visit ncregister.com. To hear the full interview, tune in to the 9 p.m. July 15 “Practicing Catholic” show, which repeats at 1 p.m. July 16 and 2 p.m. July 17 on Relevant Radio 1330 AM.
Produced by Relevant Radio and the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis, the latest show also includes interviews with Father Tony O’Neill, pastor of St. John Neumann in Eagan, who describes an upcoming retreat at his parish on healing conducted by the Florida-based John Paul II Healing Center; and Shawn Phillips, director and pastoral minister at both Gichitwaa Kateri and the archdiocese’s Office of Indian Ministry, who describes the national Tekakwitha Conference coming to the Twin Cities in 2023.
Listen to their interviews after they have aired at:
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