America's Largest Catholic Newspaper
Catholic New York won first-place General Excellence honors for the fourth consecutive year in the Catholic Press Awards competition. The award, one of nine the newspaper won in the annual contest, was announced at the annual Catholic Media Conference in St. Louis June 3.
Because of a change in the format of the contest, which is sponsored by the Catholic Press Association, Catholic New York now competes in the category of non-weekly diocesan newspapers with a circulation of 25,001 or more.
The entry, for which three consecutive issues are submitted, included the issues of Sept. 3, Sept. 17 and Oct. 1. The latter two issues featured an extensive preview of Pope Francis’ visit to Cuba and the United States followed by comprehensive news and feature coverage of the visit.
The judges called CNY “a stellar paper that has the advantage of size many other publications do not have.”
“The sheer wealth of information was impressive,” they added.
The critique went on to say, “The dynamic energy of the Church in New York leaps out of the pages of this newspaper through its skilled use of photos and an interesting array of news features.”
Catholic New York also won several other writing awards, including a first-place honor for Best Editorial on a Local Issue for Mary Ann Poust’s entry, “New Blight in Times Square,” about a proliferation of problems cropping up in Times Square, which harkened back to the bad old days of that important Manhattan district.
Cardinal Dolan’s “To Whom Shall We Go?” column was recognized with a second-place award for Best Regular Column by a Bishop or Archbishop.
Catholic New York also received an honorable mention award for Best Coverage of the Papal Visit for articles by editor in chief John Woods, reporter Ron Lajoie and Ms. Poust.
Lajoie also received an honorable mention award for Best Feature Writing for his story on former Giants coach Tom Coughlin’s work on behalf of his charitable foundation, The Jay Fund.
Two of the newspaper’s photographers, Chris Sheridan and Mary DiBiase Blaich, collected a total of three awards. Sheridan was honored with a third-place prize in the Best Photo Story category for “Holy Week Begins.” Ms. Blaich received two honorable mention citations. The first, in the Best News Photo category, was for a photo taken during the Papal Mass at Madison Square Garden. The second, in the multiple picture package—sports category, was of the annual CYO cheerleading competition.
CNY’s production manager Leah Bossio earned a second-place award for an advertisement she designed in which the archdiocese’s Family Life/Respect Life Office welcomed Pope Francis.
