{"id":105482,"date":"2013-05-21T12:05:27","date_gmt":"2013-05-21T16:05:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/getreligion\/?p=105482"},"modified":"2013-05-20T23:06:30","modified_gmt":"2013-05-21T03:06:30","slug":"thats-one-very-very-poor-headline-about-the-pope","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/getreligion\/2013\/05\/thats-one-very-very-poor-headline-about-the-pope\/","title":{"rendered":"That’s one very, very poor headline about the pope"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

As I have stressed many times here at GetReligion, it\u2019s important for readers to understand that reporters rarely write the headlines that accompany their stories. <\/p>\n

Editors and specialists at copy desks write the headlines. It\u2019s tough work, and I say that as someone who did that job for several years early in my career.<\/p>\n

A good headline can really help a story. A bad one can warp the framework in which the reader encounters the ideas and fact in the text. Alas, that\u2019s just the way the business works.<\/p>\n

I often wonder if your GetReligionistas need to develop a special feature or slug-line for bad headlines about religion, especially bad headlines about stories that are either really good or, at the very least, solid.<\/p>\n

Take, for example, that Huffington Post<\/em> headline<\/a> that dominated a Reuters report about yet another interesting statement \u2014 from remarks made without a prepared text \u2014 by Pope Francis. Let\u2019s look at a key chunk of the text first:<\/p>\n

\u201cIf we step outside of ourselves, we will find poverty,\u201d he said, repeating his call for Catholics to do more to seek out those on the fringes of society who need help the most,\u201d he said from the steps of St. Peter\u2019s Basilica. \u201cToday, and it breaks my heart to say it, finding a homeless person who has died of cold, is not news. Today, the news is scandals, that is news, but the many children who don\u2019t have food \u2014 that\u2019s not news. This is grave. We can\u2019t rest easy while things are this way.\u201d<\/p>\n

The crowd, most of whom are already involved in charity work, interrupted him often with applause.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe cannot become starched Christians, too polite, who speak of theology calmly over tea. We have to become courageous Christians and seek out those (who need help most),\u201d he said.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

This is yet another example of the pope attempting to promote that has been called a \u201creligious sense\u201d or a \u201creligious sensibility\u201d that surrounds the events of everyday life. See my recent Scripps Howard column for some additional examples<\/a>.<\/p>\n

His point is that true faith is found in words matched with deeds, not with words alone.<\/p>\n

So what was the headline at HuffPo?<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Well, that would be this:<\/p>\n

Pope Francis Insists Church Must Help Poor, Not \u2018Speak Of Theology\u2019<\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Ouch.<\/p>\n

Where in the story does the pope downgrade the need for sound theology or the need to be able to speak clearly about it?<\/p>\n

Now, in the digital age, it\u2019s quite easy to tweak the size of headlines in a computer. In this case, the headline only needed one more work to be accurate \u2014 \u201cmerely.\u201d Put the word \u201cmerely\u201d in front of \u201cSpeak of Theology\u201d and you have the heart of what he said. Right?<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As I have stressed many times here at GetReligion, it\u2019s important for readers to understand that reporters rarely write the headlines that accompany their stories. Editors and specialists at copy desks write the headlines. It\u2019s tough work, and I say that as someone who did that job for several years early in my career. A […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":610,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[25,7,18,12,24,19],"tags":[1627,1167,369,15474],"class_list":["post-105482","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-catholicism","category-journalism","category-people","category-religion","category-world","category-world-religions","tag-headlines","tag-pope-francis","tag-poverty","tag-vatican"],"yoast_head":"\nThat's one very, very poor headline about the pope<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"As I have stressed many times here at GetReligion, it's important for readers to understand that reporters rarely write the headlines that accompany their\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/getreligion\/2013\/05\/thats-one-very-very-poor-headline-about-the-pope\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"That's one very, very poor headline about the pope\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"As I have stressed many times here at GetReligion, it's important for readers to understand that reporters rarely write the headlines that accompany their\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/getreligion\/2013\/05\/thats-one-very-very-poor-headline-about-the-pope\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"GetReligion\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2013-05-21T16:05:27+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2013-05-21T03:06:30+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/wp.patheos.com.s3.amazonaws.com\/blogs\/getreligion\/files\/2013\/05\/o-POPE-FRANCIS-TWITTER-facebook.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"tmatt\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"tmatt\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/getreligion\/2013\/05\/thats-one-very-very-poor-headline-about-the-pope\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/getreligion\/2013\/05\/thats-one-very-very-poor-headline-about-the-pope\/\",\"name\":\"That's one very, very poor headline about the pope\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/getreligion\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2013-05-21T16:05:27+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2013-05-21T03:06:30+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/getreligion\/#\/schema\/person\/76ce2260a572ff41a28fb285de9350f1\"},\"description\":\"As I have stressed many times here at GetReligion, it's important for readers to understand that reporters rarely write the headlines that accompany their\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/getreligion\/2013\/05\/thats-one-very-very-poor-headline-about-the-pope\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/getreligion\/2013\/05\/thats-one-very-very-poor-headline-about-the-pope\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/getreligion\/2013\/05\/thats-one-very-very-poor-headline-about-the-pope\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/getreligion\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"That’s one very, very poor headline about the pope\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/getreligion\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/getreligion\/\",\"name\":\"GetReligion\",\"description\":\""The press . . . just doesn't get religion." - 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