Family Life

11.01.11 | Sarah Harnisch

The FCC is has been mailing letters the last few days to churches from Maine to California-- forcing them to close caption whatever they broadcast over the television.
   If a church broadcasts the word of God on T.V. without closed captions, it will now face an FCC fine. Quietly last week, theFCC ruled an exemption that allowed poorer churches to opt out of costly closed captioning for the deaf was unfair. They're now in the process of writing over 300 churches across the nation that are now in violation of the new law, and the groups will have 90 days to comply with it. The ruling was made after a large coalition of organizations for the deaf and hard of hearing raised objections, saying it was causing other non-religious groups to request an economic hardship waiver to skip out on closed captioning. Churches say they may have to drop many of their programs now, because they won't be able to afford them.