When Crisis PR Misses the Mark: A Satirical Look at the Diocese of Charlotte’s TLM Train Wreck, by John B. Manos

A PR Blunder for the Ages

I’ll admit it, as an attorney who’s been a Supreme Court clerk, an assistant attorney general, and beyond, I’m no stranger to watching PR disasters unfold. For me, it is the continuation of the forensic work I did as a chemical engineer, looking at fatal accidents and explosions. If you’ve watched gory police procedurals like Silent Witness or others, you know when the body is on the slab in the mortuary and they are figuring out how the murder was committed — that’s what this is like for me. Words and communications piece back like wound marks and bullet trails to tell me what’s going on.

Even with that sort of background, the Diocese of Charlotte’s handling of the Traditional Latin Mass cessation is leaving me slack-jawed. How could a situation dripping with such spiritual weight be met with such tone-deaf crisis management? It’s like watching someone try to fix a broken stained-glass window with duct tape and black plastic sheeting. I’m forced to wonder: if this is the “polished” PR response, how chaotic must things be behind closed doors for the crisis team to even be called in? Buckle up, because we’re about to unpack this mess—complete with satire, questions, and a hard look at what went wrong. …

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