On the media’s habit of showing habited nuns

Last updated on: March 24, 2013 at 2:32 pm By mollie

Quick follow-up to a recent post highlighting some problems with 60 Minutes’ coverage of Roman Catholic women religious in the United States. Commenter Deacon John M. Bresnahan wrote: Most of the media can’t seem to find traditional type Catholics to interview. There is a group of conservative-traditional nuns called the Council of Major Superiors of women religious that is almost never called on by the media. And it is the radical nuns group that 60 Minutes loves whose religious orders... Read more

One-sided look at controversial Baptist flock in Charlotte

Last updated on: March 24, 2013 at 1:26 pm By tmatt

It has been quite some time since I have used an old GetReligion term (Cheers!), so I think it might help for me to pause and explain the “tmatt trio” to new readers. Back when I was on the religion beat full-time, I developed a series of three doctrinal questions that helped me scope out the dividing lines inside the battles that were shaking so many Christian denominations and ministries. You see, they all seemed to be arguing about the... Read more

Francis coverage unfair to atheists?

Last updated on: March 23, 2013 at 7:15 pm By geoconger

And now for something completely different in the coverage of the election of Pope Francis — complaints from Viennese newspaper Der Standard that some coverage was unfair to atheists. In an editorial discussing the press coverage of the election of Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio as the 226th Bishop of Rome the left liberal daily took the state TV broadcaster ORF to task for its one-sided and uncritical reporting. Im ORF wurden in den verschiedensten Nachrichten-Formaten die Bilder gezeigt, wie sich der... Read more

Ghosts in news about those monks and their simple caskets

Last updated on: March 22, 2013 at 2:46 pm By tmatt

So, in one level, my primary task in this post is to point GetReligion readers toward a very interesting business story in The New Orleans Times-Picayune. It is also interesting to note that this business story focuses on an important collision between big business and the free exercise of religion. So far so good. The story gets the basics, when it comes to to both of those topics, including a nod toward the religious liberty question. However, in this case... Read more

Invincible ignorance on the Anglican Ordinariate

Last updated on: March 22, 2013 at 3:29 pm By geoconger

In this age of citizen journalism, blogger news, free content and PR driven stories there still remains a place for professional religion writers — reporters who know the topic they are covering and understand the rules of the journalistic craft. This story from the Huffington Post highlights the journalistic shortcomings of the new media. Entitled: “Catholic Church, Facing U.S. Priest Shortage, Now Using Anglican Converts To Serve Parishes” begins with a false assumption that distorts the story, while missing the... Read more

At last! Actual journalism on the same-sex marriage beat

Last updated on: March 22, 2013 at 11:31 am By mollie

This week marks the 10th anniversary of the beginning of the Iraq War. I was an early skeptic of the war, back when that was a somewhat lonely place to be. Journalists who engaged in more cheerleading than skepticism toward that war have been spending the week issuing mea culpas for their failure to consider unintended consequences. In fact, so many people have been writing their “I was wrong” pieces that the contrarian in me wonders whether I should change... Read more

Hey CNN: Ghosts in the ties that bind Cyprus and Russia

Last updated on: March 21, 2013 at 2:40 pm By tmatt

So I’m sitting in a restaurant eating my lunch and, up on the wall, the large-screen television is tuned to CNN, where a lengthy report is unfolding about a European Union plan attempt to raise the corporate tax rates on Cyprus, a land in which wealthy Russians have funneled billions into tax shelters. It’s all quite complex and offers yet another wrinkle in the larger financial crisis in Mediterranean markets and governance. This is a valid and important story. I... Read more

Putting a human face on illegal immigration

Last updated on: March 21, 2013 at 1:37 pm By Bobby Ross Jr.

Get Religion crickets, prepare to chirp. You guessed it: I’m going to write about media coverage of evangelicals and immigration reform. Again To read my previous posts, click here, here, here and here. My basic complaint in each of those posts: broad generalizations about a complicated issue. More than once, I have voiced my desire to see a reporter interview ordinary Christians about the issue rather than rely on an advocacy group’s talking points. Enter Bob Smietana, award-winning Godbeat scribe for The Tennessean. A... Read more

Did ‘the’ leader of the Orthodox attend the Rome rites?

Last updated on: March 20, 2013 at 6:02 pm By tmatt

So, let’s assume that you are a Catholic leader and you pick up your morning newspaper and it contains a story in which Pope Francis is described as “a leader” of the world’s Catholic Christians. What would you think? Is the phrase “a leader” — implying one among many equals — an accurate way to describe the unique, singular, authoritative role played in global Catholicism by the occupant of St. Peter’s throne? The answer, of course, is “no.” So, let’s... Read more

The new ‘abortion’: cutting newborns’ spinal cords

Last updated on: March 20, 2013 at 2:40 pm By mollie

Two years ago, Dr. Kermit Gosnell was arrested for the murders of eight people at the abortion clinic a jury called a “house of horrors.” As I wrote at that time, normally if anyone in the country is accused of murdering eight people (and, in fact, a reading of the grand jury report indicates he is suspected in the murders of untold more, and I do mean untold), that would be big news. This has not been big news. It’s... Read more