Media outlets had a lot of fun with a recent story about a Vatican gatecrasher. A sample of the headlines include Time: Fake Bishop Tries to Sneak into Vatican Meeting; Vanity Fair: Theological Espionage! Fake Bishop Sneaks Into Vatican; NPR: At The Vatican, ‘No Rush’ To Set Conclave; And A Fake Bishop Tries To Get In; Daily Beast: Fake Bishop Sneaks Into Vatican; San Francisco Chronicle: Vatican not amused by fake bishop who posed with cardinals; and CNN: Fake bishop... Read more
Do you speak duck? Last Wednesday night, the Season 3 premiere of A&E’s “Duck Dynasty” delivered 8.6 million viewers, beating Fox’s “American Idol” and ABC’s “Modern Family” in the important 18- to 49-year-olds demographic. In a featured titled “Faith, family and ducks,” I profiled the Robertson family for The Christian Chronicle this past fall: WEST MONROE, La. — Hollywood, meet the real Robertsons. A&E’s hit reality series “Duck Dynasty” has made celebrities out of Duck Commander Phil Robertson, his wife Kay and... Read more
Yesterday we looked at some of this week’s worst examples of some major media’s trouble covering homosexuality or same-sex marriage. It was what I was thinking about as I ruminated on a first-person essay on TheAtlantic.com headlined: There Probably Isn’t Any Neutral Way to Report on Homosexuality Journalists could do better at conveying the best traditionalist arguments against gay marriage. But some people won’t be satisfied unless gays are stigmatized as in bygone days. The Atlantic piece, written by Conor... Read more
Thanks to the many readers who sent in kind words regarding my piece last week on the Washington Post ombudsman column that shed light on how bigoted some in the media are when it comes to covering those who oppose changing marriage laws to include same-sex couples. That column, which quoted directly from a shockingly ignorant and contemptuous Washington Post reporter’s email — and then piled on with some further ignorance about arguments regarding same-sex marriage law — has generated... Read more
Here we go again, once more into the legal thicket that surrounds private colleges and universities, on the cultural left or right. Once again, let me note that the school involved in this story — California Baptist University — is a member of the Council for Christian Colleges and Universities, the national and global network in which I work and teach, as director of the Washington Journalism Center. I have close friends and associates at California Baptist. I also am... Read more
Yesterday tmatt asked readers to submit links to papal coverage that was particularly good or bad. I’m going to go ahead and put my responses in a separate post. It begins, as all our best material does, with a comment thread from last week: Julia says: Can’t find it now, but there was an article on MSNBC.com (I think) that said JPII, in the 1990s, changed the ancient conclave rules so that the Cardinals could be let out of the... Read more
This is one of those GetReligion follow-up posts where we basically say, “See, was that so hard?” Back in December, I raised a few questions about media coverage of “The Bible,” the epic miniseries that debuted Sunday night on the History Channel. In reading an in-depth feature by CNN Belief Blog co-editor Eric Marrapodi over the weekend, I was pleased to see my questions answered. Obviously, Marripodi pays close attention to the excellent insight at GetReligion. Or maybe he’s just good at his... Read more
The thought for the day and, perhaps, for the next week or two, care of Father James Martin, the chaplain of The Colbert Report and author of the essential “Between Heaven and Mirth: Why Joy, Humor, and Laughter Are at the Heart of the Spiritual Life.” The problem, as you will see in this Facebook entry, is that — other than a choice poke or two — I don’t think this particular Jesuit is laughing at the moment. Hang on.... Read more
Yesterday, reader Ivan (aka @SlavicPolymath) tweeted: NPR Weekend Edition interviewing LCWR sister. Hoping beyond hope for balanced coverage, or I’ll sic @GetReligion on them. I asked him how it went. He replied by linking to his subsequent tweet, which read, simply: …NOPE. There was no transcript available at that time so I listened to the interview. You really have to listen to get the full Schweddy Balls effect. It is, if anything, even funnier than the Saturday Night Live sketch... Read more
Let me share two items with readers this weekend, both of a personal nature. The first is personal, in that one of your GetReligionistas has been missing for a few days and his readers need to know why. Father George Conger recently had some serious spinal surgery and, while it went well, this is not the kind of thing that one recovers from quickly. He faces some pretty serious rehabilitation and it may be some time before he is his... Read more
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