FAB FEATURE ON GOD GIRL/TGF FROM RELIGION NEWS SERVICE

Reporter finds ‘God Factor’ in 32 celebrities

By BOB SMIETANA
Religion News Service
CHICAGO — Cathleen Falsani has a few rules when it comes to religion reporting:

No finger pointing.

Never turn your tape recorder off.

Listen intently without worrying about the next question.

And remember all truth is God’s truth — whether it comes from a church pulpit or the Playboy Mansion.

That’s why in the summer of 2004, Falsani, religion writer for the Chicago Sun-Times, found herself outside Hugh Hefner’s palatial home, telling a “talking rock” by the gate that she was there to ask the Playboy founder what he thought about God.

The gate opened and before long, Falsani, a self-described “born again, left-leaning evangelical” was deep in a surprising conversation with Hefner about the meaning of life. It was, Falsani, recalls in her new book, The God Factor, something she could “never have imagined in a million years.”

Falsani’s curiosity about how people see God, and her love of a good story, inspired The God Factor, which was released Tuesday.The book, based on a series that ran in the Sun-Times, features conversations on spirituality with an eclectic group of 32 public figures. Some, like Bono, Sen. Barack Obama, novelist Anne Rice, and White House speechwriter Michael Gerson, have been outspoken about their faith. Others, like Chicago Cubs manager Dusty Baker, singer Annie Lennox, actor John Mahoney and economist Jeffrey Sachs, had rarely spoken about it before.

The idea, Falsani said in an interview at Chicago’s House of Blues, was to view the breadth of religious faith in America through the eyes of well-known people.

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