Newspaper Fires Staff Writers Amid Allegations That They Had Opinions 

Image: Andrew Hermiz

Two National Catholic Register staff writers have been fired and are now facing possible public flogging after they allegedly had opinions and were outspoken about them.

The National Catholic Register on Monday terminated Mark Shea and Simcha Fisher from their positions as staff writers from the EWTN-owned newspaper. Reports from several bloggers say that they were fired for allegedly saying stuff that kinda pissed some Catholics off, but made other Catholics happy.

According to officials at the National Catholic Register, comments from Shea and Fisher on Facebook did not conform to EWTN social media standards that require articles be “within the safe confines of the Catholic bubble from which no debate or critical thinking may be had.” 

An anonymous National Catholic Register official reported this morning that a phone call from EWTN chairman of the board and chief executive officer Michael Warsaw was made to the newspaper, asking, “Will no one rid me of these troublesome writers?”

Shea and Fisher were subsequently censured, and all Catholics who owned books by the accused were asked to burn them “effective immediately.” 

“When it came down to it, it was tone,” said the anonymous National Catholic Register official who was being closely watched by an armed EWTN agent. “As everyone knows, EWTN’s audience is mainly comprised of dinosaurs, and dinosaurs don’t like loud noises. One of EWTN’s younger readers who was born in the Cretaceous Era complained that the tone of former staff writers Mr. Shea and Mrs. Fisher was loud. She said that the tone rattled her like a ‘Triceratops hearing the roar of a Tyrannosaurus Rex.’ It had nothing to do with their positions on certain topics, which have not only conformed with the vision of our newspaper, but which have also been celebrated by us for many years.”

“Our EWTN readers,” he went on to say, “are not good with handling people with tempers. St. Jerome, for instance, was known for his temper, which is why those at EWTN, praise be their name, have opened a commission with the Vatican to investigate the possibility of de-canonizing St. Jerome.”