Crux celebrates ‘Independence Day’

An editor’s note on Crux’s ‘Independence Day’
John L. Allen Jr. is the editor of Crux. Image: Diocese of Parramatta.

By John L. Allen Jr., April 4, 2017

April 1 marks Crux’s “Independence Day,” meaning the one-year anniversary of our life as an independent news agency no longer part of the Boston Globe. While much has changed, one thing remains constant: Crux’s determination, in an era of ideologically and politically aligned news, to lean neither to the left nor the right, but to embody the classic Catholic both/and.

Today marks the one-year anniversary of Crux as an independent operation, no longer part of the Boston Globe, and it seems a good moment to say something about our past, present, and future.

Our story begins in March of 2016, when, out of the blue, we were told the Globe was pulling the plug at the end of the month. Suddenly unemployed and bereft of institutional backing, four of us – myself, associate editor Shannon Levitt, Vatican correspondent (and now co-editor) Inés San Martín, and advertising director Terri Lynn – basically refused to accept the death sentence.

That decision gave us twenty days to figure out a survival strategy. Things came together quickly, thanks to two sponsors who stepped up immediately: The Knights of Columbus became our principal partner, joined by the DeSales Media Group in the Diocese of Brooklyn. Later, the Archdiocese of Washington, the Archdiocese of New York, and the Archdiocese of Los Angeles all came on board.

All our sponsors made a firm commitment to respecting Crux’s editorial independence, and they’ve honored it.

We’re also grateful to advertisers who stuck with us from day one – including the USCCB “Fortnight for Freedom” project, the Mission Doctor’s Association, Boston College, Creighton University, and Loyola University Press – as well as all those who have joined us since.

From there, we launched (a bit naïvely, in retrospect) into running a 24/7 news site with half our previous staff and budget. To be honest, most of the last year seems a blur to me – like one of those old British comedies where everybody’s running around on fast-forward, to the tune of “Yakety Sax”.

Fortunately, we’ve been able to expand our staff with the additions of Claire Giangravè as editorial assistant and correspondent, and Charles Collins, a 15-year veteran of Vatican Radio, as managing editor. That’s relieved the immediate pressure, and allowed us to do some thinking about where we go from here.

Continue reading the full story here.

 

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