Sessualità e stampa cattolica in Italia: un confronto fra aree e riviste

We here present some results of a wider research about the representation of sexuality on the Italian Catholic press. Specifically, the paper analyzes four magazines, different for editorial characteristics and ethical approach: to stratify the phenomenon we used the typology proposed by Garelli (1991), with the goal to test it and to determine whether the four magazines express actually different conceptions on the topic of sexuality, whether there are instead convergences and whether the representations of sexuality on the Catholic press are congruent with the official positions promoted by the Holy See in its documents. To achieve our purpose, we adopted a Foucaltian perspective (1976) assuming that, in the Catholic propaganda, sex is not only the object of taboos, prohibitions and complaints, but is also framed in a positive discourse that highlights some of its attributes, components and contexts: in particular, sex is dislodged from its biological value to confer it an higher meaning tied to the conditions of its lawful exercise, namely a stable heterosexual relationship within marriage. From our empirical analysis emerged that the four magazines express aligned positions, even if with some relevant differences that reflect, in the way they speak about sexuality, the pluralism within the Catholic associationism identified by Garelli. The official Magisterium is embedded in substance, but declined according to different accents and sensitivities.