The Washington Post’s coverage of the recent change in marriage law here has been, unsurprisingly, of the partisan cheerleading variety. I’ve read a few reports and pondered if they would have been written terribly differently if they’d been issued as press releases from the communications shops of organizations advocating for same-sex marriage. “Gay marriages to boost sagging economy!” “Mexico City shows that gay marriage is awesome!” You get the idea.

It’s so unbelievably lopsided that I’d actually grown weary of remarking on it (after these three pieces last week). But yesterday’s ombudsman column comparing proponents of traditional marriage to racist bigots has dragged me back in.

First, let’s take a trip down memory lane. Last year, a Washington Post “Style” reporter wrote a fairly favorable piece about the National Organization for Marriage’s Brian Brown. To be precise, it was favorable to him but not to the movement he is part of. In Brown, the reporter noted, she’d found a “sane” supporter of traditional marriage — unlike those other people, the frothing at the mouth loonies who are bigoted and evil. I had criticized the piece for being fluffy (which I do for many of these profiles — the old Kate Michelman one comes to mind) but also for throwing every other supporter of traditional marriage under the bus. And I thought that while it was nice that the paper included a profile of a traditional marriage supporter, that his arguments should be included in the actual news areas of the paper.

Supporters of same-sex marriage, however, really didn’t like the piece (too favorable, they thought) and wrote to Washington Post ombudsman Andrew Alexander to complain. He wrote a column apologizing for the story. Not because it treated all but one supporter of traditional marriage as bigots. No. Here’s one criticism he leveled at the piece:

Finally, the headline: “Opposing Gay Unions With Sanity & a Smile.” To many readers, The Post was saying Brown’s views are sane. The headline, written by editors, not Hesse, should have been neutral.

See, Alexander believed it was not “neutral” to say that it’s sane to believe that the institution of marriage should be heterosexual. Nevermind that marriage has, until a few short years ago, been universally accepted across all religions, cultures and peoples as a heterosexual institution. Those majorities of voters in 30 states that have decided to retain the traditional view of marriage as a heterosexual institution are not “proceeding from sound mind” in the view of Alexander.

And let’s go back a bit more down memory lane. This time to 2004, when previous ombudsman Michael Getler said the Post had mangled same-sex marriage debate coverage:

[C]ritics who say the paper has had few, if any, features portraying opponents of this social change in a positive or even neutral light have a point. The overall picture, it seems to me, could use more balance.

Okay, yesterday the ombudsman discussed reader reaction to a photo of two men kissing. It ran on the newspaper’s front page and online last week. He heard from upset parents who felt that the picture was inappropriate for the front page, and men who said they’d cancel their subscription if they saw “another photo of men lip-locking.” Others used slurs to complain about the photo. (What is it about the debate that causes such vitriol, I wonder? Almost every time I write about it, I receive threats and get called horrible names myself and I find it most discouraging. I wish people would learn how to discuss their differences civilly, sigh.) Anyway, a couple dozen people canceled their subscriptions, citing the photo. He asks:

Did the Post go too far? Of course not. The photo deserved to be in newspaper and on its Web site, and it warranted front-page display.

News photos capture reality. And the prominent display reflects the historic significance of what was occurring. The recent D.C. Council decision to approve same-sex marriage was the culmination of a decades-long gay rights fight for equality. Same-sex marriage is now legal in the District. The photo of [two men] kissing simply showed joy that would be exhibited by any couple planning to wed — especially a couple who previously had been denied the legal right to marry.

There was a time, after court-ordered integration, when readers complained about front-page photos of blacks mixing with whites. Today, photo images of same-sex couples capture the same reality of societal change.

Booyah! You get that, readers who didn’t like the front-page photo? You’re nothing better than racist, evil bigots.

I’m beginning to wonder if anyone at the Post has met a single supporter of traditional marriage other than that one reporter meeting Brian Brown. I mean, are they even trying to be fair? The week after even the Post has become aware that there might be some unintended consequences to rewriting marriage law, you’d think they’d reach out to those people who have concerns. Apparently not.

And you have to wonder what happened to Alexander’s stated claim that the Post needs to be “neutral” about such things. So let me get this straight — it’s not “neutral” to consider an opponent of same-sex marriage “sane” but it is “neutral” to compare opponents of same-sex marriage to racist bigots?

Good to know, Mr. Ombudsman!

Back in my Denver days, I covered a remarkable meeting about intermarriage between Jews and Christians, in this case Catholics. In the summary remarks, one of the rabbis made a comment that has always stuck with me.

This liberal rabbi was not in favor of intermarriage, but he was not opposed either. He knew the realities of life in the age of assimilation. He knew the numbers in his own congregation. However, there was one thing he strongly opposed — people trying to raise their children in both faiths at the same time.

The bottom line: The rabbi said that, statistically, there was a better chance that children raised in Jewish-Christian families would eventually choose to live their lives as Jews if they were raised as Christians than if their parents attempted to raise them half and half. All that approach taught the children was that faith was a buffet and that their choices didn’t really matter much. The key was whether the children were taught that faith actually mattered in their lives. They would eventually make their own choices about the faith that they would practice.

I thought about that when I received a URL from a regular GetReligion reader that pointed toward this conversation-starter of a headline: “Will Chelsea Clinton have a Jewish wedding?” Another version of the same story added this spicy second deck: “Few details are known about ceremony, but speculation is running rampant.”

Interested? Here’s the top of the story:

NEW YORK — Her mother is a churchgoing Methodist. Her father is a Southern Baptist. Yet could Chelsea Clinton be planning one of the biggest Jewish weddings of the year?

The 30-year-old graduate student and her Jewish fiance, Marc Mezvinsky, 32, announced their engagement in November and told friends they were looking to a possible summer ceremony. The families have revealed no specifics about the wedding. … That hasn’t stopped the speculation. The bride and groom have a range of choices, including conversion or a melding their two traditions into one ceremony.

The talk has been strongest in the Jewish community. There has been more rejoicing than lamenting about this interfaith union that brings a former first daughter a step closer to the fold. Still, they wonder: Has Chelsea been searching for a rabbi along with her gown?

The Associated Press story includes quite a bit of information about intermarriage and the possible impact of this issue on the actual wedding ceremony itself. That’s all well and good.

What we don’t have here is anything that moves beyond the level of speculation about the faith issues. In other words, this is a celebrity wedding story, not a story about a decision about faith and tradition involving two believers. Over at her Faith & Reason weblog, USA Today religion writer Cathy Grossman actually asks the relevant question head on: “Convert for love, Round 2: Will Chelsea Clinton follow Ivanka Trump?”

That sure puts things in perspective. Is this young lady like a Trump?

I guess this celebrity approach is to be expected, after all Chelsea has been through. This is a young woman who has spent plenty of time in probing spotlights, because of her parents. She does not owe the world an announcement about her faith. Nevertheless, it sure does make the journalism awkward.

Meanwhile, this is about as deep as the AP report gets:

Chelsea Clinton grew up attending Methodist church with her mother. Bill Clinton has been close to his pastor in Arkansas, but the Southern Baptist Convention rebuked him years ago over his support for gay relationships and abortion rights.

Last year, Chelsea, a graduate student at Columbia University’s School of Public Health, was seen attending Yom Kippur services with Marc at the Jewish Theological Seminary in New York, the flagship for Conservative Judaism, according to news reports. Mezvinsky is a son of former Pennsylvania Rep. Marjorie Margolies-Mezvinsky and former Iowa Rep. Ed Mezvinsky, longtime friends of the Clintons. His parents, who are divorced, had attended a Conservative Jewish synagogue in Pennsylvania.

Hillary Clinton has strong ties of her own to the Jewish community from serving as a senator from New York.

“She has probably been in more temples by far than either you or I,” said Rabbi Jerome Davidson, rabbi emeritus at Temple Beth-El of Great Neck, which Hillary Clinton has visited.

To pull this matter full circle, there is this statement near the end of the report:

The high rate of intermarriage has been an obsession in the Jewish community, which has struggled with how welcoming it should be to mixed-faith couples.

Why is this? Jewish leaders know the statistics. The ultimate issue is whether people — and children — who live in interfaith homes will ever make a solid, committed decision about whether to embrace, practice and hand down a living faith.

This is emotional territory, as young master Brad Greenberg’s earlier post noted. It’s a cliche to say that marriages and the children that follow are the future, but the statement is also true.

What is hanging in the balance? Many Jews will state this matter bluntly: The future of the Jewish faith.

Photo: Care of Celebrity Weddings 411.

Say what you will about the Church of Scientology, but its members are tenacious. I have some friends who left the church 30 years ago and they are still occasionally contacted by members who encourage them to be careful with what they say. And what’s interesting about that is that my friends actually have many positive things to say about the church and what they got out of it.

Last year I highlighted a captivating three-part series on the church that ran in the St. Petersburg Times. The reporters spoke with four former members, some of whom were very high ranking, and wrote about their claims of mismanagement in the church. One former member had previously made news as the public relations official who was videotaped in a confrontation with a BBC reporter.

That series marked the first time a major paper had dealt substantively with claims of physical and mental abuse by Scientology’s current leadership. It broke news and it gave the Church of Scientology ample space and time to respond to claims. For their part, church officials discounted all the former members’ allegations as coming from poor performing employees who inflated their importance. To bolster their claim, the church opened up former members’ “ethics files” and showed records of their “confessions, contritions and laments that the church keeps to document their failures.”

This weekend, New York Times religion reporter Laurie Goodstein took on the issue. She speaks with two other former members who raise a separate complaint about the Church of Scientology:

Raised as Scientologists, Christie King Collbran and her husband, Chris, were recruited as teenagers to work for the elite corps of staff members who keep the Church of Scientology running, known as the Sea Organization, or Sea Org.

They signed a contract for a billion years — in keeping with the church’s belief that Scientologists are immortal. They worked seven days a week, often on little sleep, for sporadic paychecks of $50 a week, at most.

But after 13 years and growing disillusionment, the Collbrans decided to leave the Sea Org, setting off on a Kafkaesque journey that they said required them to sign false confessions about their personal lives and their work, pay the church thousands of dollars it said they owed for courses and counseling, and accept the consequences as their parents, siblings and friends who are church members cut off all communication with them.

Writing about the Church of Scientology can be difficult. The church takes a strong interest in its public relations and fiercely fights any negative stories that appear. And the claims made by former Scientologists are always strongly disputed by church officials. Goodstein handles this simply by quoting the opposing sides. She says that former members are calling for a Reformation. Here’s a sample response from the church:

The church has responded to the bad publicity by denying the accusations and calling attention to a worldwide building campaign that showcases its wealth and industriousness. Last year, it built or renovated opulent Scientology churches, which it calls Ideal Orgs, in Rome; Malmo, Sweden; Dallas; Nashville; and Washington. And at its base here on the Gulf Coast of Florida, it continued buying hotels and office buildings (54 in all) and constructing a 380,000-square-foot mecca that looks like a convention center.

“This is a representation of our success,” said the church’s spokesman, Tommy Davis, showing off the building’s cavernous atrium, still to be clad in Italian marble, at the climax of a daylong tour of the church’s Clearwater empire. “This is a result of our expansion. It’s pinch-yourself material.”

Reading this story, I’m reminded of something I’ve said before about Goodstein. She manages to pack so much information into so few words. She writes very clearly and concisely. Here she gives a view from above:

Scientology is an esoteric religion in which the faith is revealed gradually to those who invest their time and money to master Mr. Hubbard’s teachings. Scientologists believe that human beings are impeded by negative memories from past lives, and that by applying Mr. Hubbard’s “technology,” they can reach a state known as clear.

They may spend hundreds of hours in one-on-one “auditing” sessions, holding the slim silver-colored handles of an e-meter while an auditor asks them questions and takes notes on what they say and on the e-meter’s readings.

By doing enough auditing, taking courses and studying Mr. Hubbard’s books and lectures — for which some Scientologists say they have paid as much as $1 million — Scientologists believe that they can proceed up the “bridge to total freedom” and live to their full abilities as Operating Thetans, pure spirits. They do believe in God, or a Supreme Being that is associated with infinite potential.

The story allows Ms. Collbran to discuss her journey from a child raised in the church to a former member. It’s a fascinating personal story that includes many of the reasons why they say they couldn’t be members any more. One thing I learned from the piece was that Scientology doesn’t permit Sea Orgs to have children. Ms. Collbran intentionally got pregnant and waited until the end of her first trimester to inform the church since, she said, she’d known workers who had been kicked out when they refused to have abortions.

Getting back to the issue of competing truth claims, I thought this was a good way to handle the competing claims of Mr. Collbran — who says that Scientology is shrinking — and those of the church. After quoting Mr. Collbran saying that the Ideal Org he set up in Johannesburg was nowhere near self-supporting, Goodstein talks to the church officials:

The church is vague about its membership numbers. In 11 hours with a reporter over two days, Mr. Davis, the church’s spokesman, gave the numbers of Sea Org members (8,000), of Scientologists in the Tampa-Clearwater area (12,000) and of L. Ron Hubbard’s books printed in the last two and a half years (67 million). But asked about the church’s membership, Mr. Davis said, “I couldn’t tell you an exact figure, but it’s certainly, it’s most definitely in the millions in the U.S. and millions abroad.”

He said he did not know how to account for the findings in the American Religious Identification Survey that the number of Scientologists in the United States fell from 55,000 in 2001 to 25,000 in 2008.

I mentioned above that the former Scientologists I know have many good things to say about the church. In fact, some of them really think the media have done a horrible job explaining what’s good about Scientology. Usually described as little more than Xenu and thetan science fiction, many former Scientologists say the auditing is a strong point. And they continue to use the auditing technology after they leave.

Goodstein actually gets into this a bit by quoting church detractors speaking highly of the “old” Church of Scientology and in this description. And Ms. Collbran says she still receives auditing from other Scientologists who defected. Mr. Collbran, on the other hand, says he wants nothing to do with the religion at all.

Whenever we cover stories about Scientology, we get quite a few comments from anonymous — an anti-Scientology group mentioned in the story — and church members. I’m curious what those two groups think about this series. I suspect that the church members might not be happy with this piece — it’s highly critical of the church — but I’d like to know what the specific journalistic complaints are, if any.

Remember, we are interested in complaints about the journalism.

So this is my first real GetReligion post. Where do I start?

Do I begin with the slanted perspective of a weekend Associated Press report on home-school science textbooks? Or does the overly simplistic treatment of the subject concern me more? Slanted or simplistic? Simplistic or slanted?

Oh, all right, I’ll open with the sin of commission — the imbalance in this piece. The story immediately calls into question its own news value by leading with a 6-year-old anecdote:

LOUISVILLE, Ky. — Home-school mom Susan Mule wishes she hadn’t taken a friend’s advice and tried a textbook from a popular Christian publisher for her 10-year-old’s biology lessons.

Mule’s precocious daughter Elizabeth excels at science and has been studying tarantulas since she was 5. But she watched Elizabeth’s excitement turn to confusion when they reached the evolution section of the book from Apologia Educational Ministries, which disputed Charles Darwin’s theory.

“I thought she was going to have a coronary,” Mule said of her daughter, who is now 16 and taking college courses in Houston. “She’s like, ‘This is not true!’”

However, the anecdote sets the tone for the article: Home-school parents who believe in evolution are victims of a market that favors a “Bible-based version of the Earth’s creation.” These parents feel “isolated and frustrated.” The most popular home-school science textbooks “promulgate lies to kids” and “stack the deck against evolution.”

Grab a tissue, folks, because “if this is the way kids are home-schooled then they’re being shortchanged, both rationally and in terms of biology,” as one evolution expert tells AP.

You get the idea. These are valid questions, of course, but the story provides no concrete evidence — or even any squishy anecdotal proof — that home-school graduates receive an inferior science education to their public school counterparts. This is just assumed. Why not track down a few home-school graduates now taking university-level science courses and see how they’re doing?

To be fair, opposing viewpoints are included in the AP article, but never — in my opinion — with the same level of precision and conviction as the sources that embrace Charles Darwin and evolutionary science. The story quotes a second “disheartened” home-school parent and a third who complains about the lack of a “scientifically credible curriculum” before finally giving a voice to a creationist family in the last three paragraphs:

Adam Brown’s parents say their 16-year-old son’s belief in the Bible’s creation story isn’t deterring him from pursuing a career in marine biology. His parents, Ken and Polly Brown, taught him at their Cedar Grove, Ind., home using the Apologia curriculum and other science texts.

Polly Brown said her son would gladly take college courses that include evolution, and he’ll be able to provide the expected answers even though he disagrees.

“He probably knows it better than the kids who have been taught evolution all through public school,” Polly Brown said. “But that is in order for him to understand both sides of that argument because he will face it throughout his higher education.”

Of course, that leads to the sin of omission — the fact that this piece fails to grasp the complicated nature of the creation vs. evolution debate.

To read this story, there is only one kind of creationist and one kind of evolutionist — and never shall the twain meet. But that’s just not the case.

ReligionLink’s most recent primer on evolution explains the difference between young-Earth creationists and old-Earth creationists. And it points out that some advocates of intelligent design — the theory that the complexity of life points to a higher being at work — believe that evolution can be compatible with belief in God. Then again, ReligionLink notes:

ID (intelligent design) and creationism are not necessarily in accord with each other, and in fact proponents of each camp can argue as vociferously as Darwinists and anti-Darwinists.

It might surprise the AP writer to learn that, even among Christian university biology professors, much diversity exists on this topic. The word “evolution” means many things to many different people, and there are many people who keep getting jammed under that “creationist” umbrella that have no business being there.

Yes, I know (as an AP alum), that a reporter can’t include every detail and nuance in an 883-word story. But would a little less bias — and a little more rudimentary knowledge — be too much to ask?

I didn’t think so.

By the way, I may be new here, but I already know to ask readers to stick to the journalism issues when writing comments about a topic as hot as this one.

Image: From Wikimedia Commons.

Admittedly, this story might seem a bit stale. The news passed last month when the plight of little Ela Reyes was reported over and over on network news and the morning talk shows. Dahlia Lithwick, in a Slate article about whether a family law judge can forbid a father from taking his daughter to church, summarizes the background well for those who missed it:

Joseph Reyes, an Afghanistan war veteran and second-year law student, converted to Judaism when he married Rebecca Shapiro in 2004. When they split up in 2008, Rebecca won primary custody of their daughter, and Joseph got regular visitation. The couple had allegedly agreed to raise their child Jewish, but Joseph, seeking to expose his 3-year-old to his Catholic faith, had her baptized last November. When she learned that her daughter had been baptized without her consent, Rebecca obtained a temporary restraining order in December 2009, forbidding Joseph from “exposing Ela Reyes to another religion other than the Jewish religion during his visitation.” In January of this year, Reyes again took Ela to Mass at Holy Name Cathedral, with a local TV news crew in tow. His ex-wife’s lawyers demanded he be held in criminal contempt — with a maximum punishment of six months in prison.

This is indeed a fascinating story. It’s also exactly the type of story that reader- and viewer-needy editors and producers dream about. Which, in some iterations, means that religion becomes merely a vehicle for discusses familial dysfunction.

The Los Angeles Times headline for a story from its Chicago sister paper referred to this parental dispute as “bickering.” That’s a term I usually reserve for stubborn children not parents locked in a battle over something that people have gone to war for, but maybe there is some credence. In fact, the back-and-forth-pissing-match structure of this “exclusive” from ABC News and a quote from Ela’s mother actually give credence to the LAT headline:

“This is about parenting. This is not about religion.”

And it probably is for this family, which justifies why so many media outlets are only focusing on this specific family dynamic and on the interesting bigger issue of whether a judge has such power as to tell one parent what religion they can and can’t bring their child up in.

But there is another religious issue here that gets Anshel Pfeffer’s column in the liberal Israeli daily, Haaretz:

The crux of the case ought to be the question of what is best for the child. But how can anyone even begin to argue their position with any degree of objectivity? As it is, poor Ela will probably need years of therapy to make some sense of the depth of her parents’ enmity toward each other, and of how she was transformed into their religious football.

But for me, the interesting question is what influence this will have on Ela’s religious decisions. As she progresses from childhood through the teenage years and into adulthood, will her mother’s predominant influence cause her to see herself as one of the children of Israel, and even to take some interest in her roots? Alternatively, will the fact that Rebecca seemed intimidated by the specter of the cross - so much that she sought the court’s protection against it - intrigue Ela and attract her to the forbidden church once she is old enough to make her own choices? Or will she just turn against both religions and reach the conclusion that the only real alternative is atheism?

The real issue here transcends the powers of the divorce courts, or even the debate over which parent should be allowed to determine a child’s religious affiliation. The fundamental question is, what right do we have as parents to determine our children’s beliefs?

That’s not a question Pfeffer was prepared to answer. Nor would I imagine any family law judge. But it’s a discussion I wouldn’t mind reading about in the American MSM.

Bloggers everywhere cringed after Radar falsely claimed Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts was stepping down. “JGR would sooner die-literally-than give Obama the chance to appoint his successor,” said one expert. Supreme Court replacements are, as Ron Burgundy might say, kind of a big deal. That is why Justice John Paul Stevens, who turns 90 next month, is receiving some buzz treatment from media outlets like the Washington Post.

If Justice John Paul Stevens decides to call it a career after he turns 90 next month, the Supreme Court would for the first time in its history be without a justice belonging to America’s largest religious affiliations.

Perhaps that would mean only that religion is no longer important in the mix of experience and expertise that a president seeks in a Supreme Court nominee. There was a time, of course, in which there was a “Catholic seat” on the court, followed in 1916 with the appointment of the court’s first Jew. The days when one of each seemed sufficient are long over.

So when a Protestant no longer sits on the court, religion will no longer be considered an important factor? I’m not sure one follows another. What the reporter Robert Barnes probably means is that religion won’t necessarily be considered a make-or-break factor for President Obama’s next appointment. But to toss religion aside as unimportant seems flippant.

The reporter then chronicles justice’s respective religious affiliations.

But if the statistics are easy to assemble, the answer to the question “So what?” is elusive.

Supreme Court scholars, political scientists and constitutional experts have long debated how the religion of modern justices affects their decisions on the bench, with results that can only be categorized as negligible or inconclusive.

Yes, that “So what?” question is key. A justice probably won’t cite his or her religion as a reason for upholding a partial-birth abortion ban, but religion could hold more subtle influence on the justices. I find it hard to believe that there are no debates over religion and the Supreme Court worth discussing, even if they are “negligible or inconclusive.”

Barnes explores some obvious reasons as to why religion might make a difference.

The Catholic majority that in 2007 endorsed a law restricting abortion also staunchly defended the death penalty. The lone member of the court who has said he now believes capital punishment violates the Constitution, in fact, is Stevens, who has always been one of the most adamant about separating church and state.

Barnes seems frustrated that his Supreme Court friends don’t fit into neat categories like religion does. Oh wait.

“Clearly, the court thinks of itself as post-religious,” Barnes writes, recounting instances of when the justices have distanced themselves from their respective faiths. But does that necessarily mean they are post-religious? I wish he had elaborated on what he means by post-religious. The story quotes just one scholar, which isn’t horrible per se, but I would’ve found the story more compelling if we heard less from Barnes and more from someone who, say, spends his or her life studying this stuff.

Finally, Barnes begins to wrap up his article with an assumption that caught me off guard.

As religions become more politically active, it is natural for the public to wonder about the influence on the court.

Are particular religions rising up politically all of a sudden and I missed the trending topic on Twitter? Please explain.

Perhaps instead of looking at the political ramifications of having a non-Protestant Supreme Court justice, the reporter could have have explored how did we got to the point where some of the nation’s top judges happen to be Catholic. For instance, did it result from a Catholic emphasis on public service versus private practice?

I’m assuming a copy editor wrote the headline, “High Court: Does religion still matter?” Um, yes. An individual’s religion, or lack thereof, matters in all areas of life. Now, it might not matter in the areas where the reporter is concerned (whether the justice’s religion means he or she will decide a court case one way or another).

Because religion matters, the disappearing Protestant justice on the Supreme Court should be a major story, if only because the court’s religious diversity is diminishing. How much does it matter and why does it matter? Those are tricky questions for more reporters to explore.

Some GetReligion readers may have heard that there is this little battle going on here in Washington, D.C., about health-care reform.

You have probably read that this is a knock-down, drag-out battle between Democrats and Republicans. However, if you are reading some of the nation’s better newspapers (and lots of weblogs), you will have heard that the actual battle is inside the Democratic Party, between Democrats who are pro-abortion rights (think Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi) and those who are pro-life, to one degree or another.

Thus, just the other day I wrote the following:

I am left asking two questions, one of which is very obvious. The second one isn’t, but I bet that Pelosi and President Obama know the answer to it.

(1) How many votes remain solid in U.S. Rep. Bart Stupak’s coalition that rallied in favor of pro-life language consistent with the existing Hyde Amendment? Follow-up question: What’s happening right now at the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, and in the offices of other pro-life groups that actually want to see a health-care reform bill reach the president’s desk?

(2) How many mainstream Democrats have threatened to vote against health-care reform if it contains the Stupak language that forbids tax dollars paying for abortions?

In other words, while everyone focuses on the votes of conservatives and centrists, how many liberals are willing to block the president’s attempt at health-care reform if it does not contain abortion benefits? How many of those Democrats are pro-abortion-rights Catholics and mainline Protestants (in other words, consistent members of the religious left)?

All year long, I’ve been wondering why journalists are not writing about these basic questions. I mean, people, do the math.

Thus, I was amazed to see this simple headline the other day in The Politico: “Bishops offer help with Senate.” What is especially interesting about this article is that it address some rather obvious questions in the U.S. House, but then jumps ahead to the math in the U.S. Senate. Here’s the top of the story:

The Roman Catholic bishops signaled Thursday that if agreement is reached with House leaders on anti-abortion language, the church would work to get the votes needed to protect the provisions in the Senate — and thereby advance the shared goal with Democrats of health care reform.

“We would strongly urge everyone, Democratic and Republican, to vote to waive the point of order,” Richard Doerflinger, an associate director of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, told POLITICO. “Whether it would be enough to get to 60 votes, I can’t predict. We would certainly try.”

“I think it’s something we should explore,” said Rep. Dale Kildee (D-Mich.), a longtime opponent of abortion. “It could be something that could carry out the bishops’ objective.”

Note that, once again, the issue is who actually wants to pass a health-care bill. If the pro-life Democrats stand firm in the House, would votes on the cultural left then kill the bill? What would the White House do?

But that’s old news. The interesting thought here is whether the U.S. Catholic bishops would have any street cred with Republicans in the Senate. Are there Republicans that would want to see a bill passed that does not include funding for abortion? Or would the GOP brass put the pressure on the kill the bill, no matter what?

Again, who wants to see a health-care bill passed?

Clearly, the bishops do. With that in mind, do the Senate math.

That House deal — since weakened by the Senate — is what the bishops want to revive now as part of Obama’s final push on health care. But to survive the Senate, any revisions would need 60 votes to overcome points of order under the expedited reconciliation procedures being contemplated. Conventional wisdom has held that it will be next to impossible to cut this Gordian knot, since Republicans — with 41 votes — will be determined to disrupt health care reform. But in the November House debate, the bishops moved forcefully to squelch Republican efforts to derail the Stupak amendment; Doerflinger indicated the conference would take the same posture — that this is a vote of conscience.

“If the Stupak amendment or something equivalent to it were in the reconciliation package on the Senate floor and it was necessary to get 60 votes to waive the point of order,” he said, “we would strongly urge everyone, Democratic and Republican, to vote to waive the point of order.”

“That could be the key vote,” Kildee told POLITICO. “The bishops could say, ‘Are you really with us?’ That’s the key vote.”

Now there is a question worth pursuing. If the pro-life Democrats win in the House, would some GOP pro-lifers in the Senate see health-care reform through a different lens? In other words, would voting “yes” become the pro-life vote? For Catholics? For evangelicals? And on the other side of the aisle, what would pro-abortion-rights Catholics do?

Other than on blogs, is anyone writing about this side of the issue? In the mainstream press?

Back in December, I had some passing words of praise for Matt Labash. I will make the obligatory disclosure that I’m friendly with him, but I don’t think that in any biases me when I say he’s easily one of the best magazine writers in the country. Just go ahead buy the recently released collection of his work and thank me later.

Labash has a talent for sniffing out and profiling really interesting people — or in some cases, publicly shaming them. The profile piece is pretty much his bread and butter, and as someone who’s been around the block a bit as a journalist, let me tell you profiles are just about the hardest thing to write. Labash is phenomenally good at them, and if he wrote for Esquire as opposed to a small circulation magazine otherwise devoted to conservative politics he’d have to rent storage for his National Magazine Awards.

So with that in mind, do not let the fact that I’m about to recommend that you drop whatever it is you’re reading and read 10,000+ word piece intimidate you. In Labash’s capable hands it will breeze by, and by any measure his profile of a priest prone to profane outbursts doing mission work in post-earthquake Haiti is a marvel, and the kind of thing he was born to write.

The piece just oozes humanity. Take this anecdote about Father Frechette and the weekly morgue runs his mission makes, where they bury the heaps of unclaimed dead bodies an area outside Port-Au-Prince known as Titanyen, which translates from Creole as the “fields of less than nothing.” Frechette has never gotten used to the smell so he smokes Marlboro Reds and drinks Barbancourt rum:

He’s been doing the morgue runs for 15 years, but has never gotten used to the smell. It makes him so sick, he brings along rum and cigarettes. “People ask me if I smoke,” he says. “Only on Thursdays.” The Haitians avail themselves of the goods, but for Frechette, they’re not optional. Without the spirit’s fumes and cigarette smoke chasing the smell of the dead out of his nostrils, he vomits, which his Haitian colleagues find amusing.

When he returned to Haiti right after the earthquake, there was an overflow crowd at the morgue, literally thousands of dead laid out in the street in front of it. “They were picking them up with backhoes and bucket-loaders, dumping them into trucks,” says Frechette, adding that the machines crunched the bodies against the walls in order to be able to scoop them. “They were hanging out the sides like crabs in a bucket. Really, really terrible. It was so shocking, so disgusting, I yelled, ‘Give me a cigarette!’”

His Haitian right-hand and all-around fixer, Raphael — whom Frechette regards as something close to a brother — couldn’t find them. Frechette, now desperately gagging, was yelling, “Give me a f—ing cigarette!!!” A journalist, taking in the scene, sidled up to him. “I heard somebody say, ‘I’m an ABC affiliate, and I’m wondering, are you Father Frechette?’ I said, ‘Do I look like a priest?’ I wasn’t going to be caught using foul language.” By the time the cigarettes were found, he says, it was too late. “I was empty of everything.”

Maybe it’s just me but the portrayal of an otherwise immensely courageous priest as a complicated, impious human being is downright refreshing. That anecdote is near the beginning of the piece and it’s one of the first of many that will threaten to tear a hole in your heart.

But of great interest to me were the revelatory moments where Frechette attempts to explain himself, and how he copes with unfathomable suffering on daily basis — in Frechette’s case, a finely honed sense of dark humor is something of a salve:

He knows it, too, and figures that second only to his faith in a God that orders the universe even amidst the apparent chaos, humor is his salvation. He tells me he read somewhere that a normal reaction to a normal thing is normal, and an abnormal reaction to an abnormal thing is normal. But a normal reaction to an abnormal thing is abnormal. Even so, there’s a “hierarchy of maturity,” he says. You can become a “psychological fetus,” upon witnessing horrors like Haiti’s, which makes you a burden to everybody, as the problem becomes comforting you. You can become angry, blaming everyone or everything. But the most productive abnormal reaction, he says, is to find laughter. He does that, he reasons, and it keeps him moving. And he always has to keep moving.

Or again his reaction to this story about how Frechette tries to reconcile an incident where he and some nuns come across a boy who’s burned alive in the street by gang members. The boy’s mother tries to thank them:

Then she saw it come back. And the people in it got out, and “put out my son like I was wishing I could put out the fire on my son’s body.” Then they picked him up until he was clean. Then they prayed for him. “Everything she tried to do was done in front of her, by absolute strangers who didn’t know her or her kid.”

Of all the emotions the woman was entitled to, he wouldn’t guess gratitude would be high on the list. And yet there she was. “It made her able to live with it,” Frechette thinks. “It’s like God sent someone to help her, like it restored her faith in humanity again. … I call it the countersign. The terrible thing that’s in front of you, you hurry, and offset it right away. Before what happens is too taxing and too poisonous. … Sometimes with horrible things, you really feel there is nothing you can do. Nothing. You’re just useless. But over time, you start seeing that to do the right thing no matter what has tremendous power.”

I don’t want to belabor this, because this is one of the best things you’re going to read all year. There’s no point in denying the tremendous power of this piece and there’s no shortage of religion in it.

That said, I do half-wish that there was some slightly more explicit discussion of Frechette’s theological outlook, considering the man wrestles with more theodicy before nine a.m. than some people do in their lifetimes. But if the story lacks that, it could simply be that Labash, mighty fine writer that he is, is simply more invested in showing rather than telling. I got a better grasp in this story of the challenges of mission work from a vocational perspective than just about anything I’ve ever read, so I guess even at 10,000 words you can’t possibly say everything.

Just read the piece already, and say prayer for Haiti if you’re so inclined.

For a faithful GetReligion reader such as myself, joining the team of contributors is like a baseball fan invited to sit in the press box and share his opinions during the World Series.

Although it’s not quite in the same league as my beloved Texas Rangers, I’m a big fan of this weblog and its endeavor to pinpoint and expose the religion ghosts in the secular news media.

A bit about me: I’m a journalist with 20 years of experience as a reporter and editor for secular and religious media ranging from The Associated Press to The Christian Chronicle.

My baptism into the exciting and complicated world of religion writing — baptism by fire, you might say — came in 1999 when top editors at The Oklahoman assigned me to cover Pope John Paul II’s visit to St. Louis.

After nearly 10 years in the newspaper business, I knew how to chase fire trucks and police cars and burn the midnight oil with city councils and school boards. But my knowledge of the Roman Catholic Church was scant. Honestly, I had no idea what a diocese was. I didn’t know the difference between a bishop and a cardinal. I had heard of the pope.

Despite a mild case of fear and trembling, I researched the basics of Catholic faith and prepared to handle the assignment. I wrote three or four Page 1 stories the week of the pope’s visit. My favorite focused on a youth event where Catholic teens jammed to the ear-piercing beat of DC Talk’s “Jesus Freak” before welcoming to the stage a gray-haired pontiff who walked with a cane.

A Church of Christ preacher’s son with a journalism degree from Oklahoma Christian University, I was pleased to discover that I could maintain the traditional standards of journalism, striving to treat the faith of others with respect while not compromising my own beliefs.

When The Oklahoman’s religion editor position became open, I left the state desk and wrote about Mormons, Muslims and many other faiths full time. I covered the Southern Baptist Convention annual meetings and the Catholic clergy sexual abuse scandals.

In 2002, I went to work for The Associated Press in Nashville. I later transferred to the AP bureau in Dallas. At AP, I received what I would describe as graduate-level instruction in religion reporting from Godbeat pros Richard Ostling and Rachel Zoll.

With AP, I wrote about battling Baptists and Episcopalians too; about e-tithing, frequent-flier rabbis and potbellied preachers; about Joel Osteen, T.D. Jakes and the Ed Youngs; about how Jesus would vote and the Knights of Columbus too; and about a million different ways (I’m exaggerating) that religion touches our culture and lives, from Mel Gibson’s Passion of the Christ movie to two Holocaust survivors finding each other after 60 years.

AP photographer LM Otero and I joined a Pentecostal group from Texas for a week at an orphanage in violence-ridden Juarez, Mexico. The 2,300-word story of what compelled these charismatic Christians from hundreds of miles away to spend a week in a Mexican border town made the front page of several newspapers nationwide, including the Los Angeles Times’ early Sunday edition.

Twice in my time with AP, I was named a national finalist for the Religion Newswriters Association’s Supple Religion Writer of the Year Award.

I left AP in 2005 to become managing editor of The Christian Chronicle, an international newspaper for Churches of Christ. I cover national news and write the Inside Story column for the Chronicle, the top national newspaper in the 2009 “Best of the Christian Press” contest sponsored by the Associated Church Press. I also write freelance stories for Christianity Today, Religion News Service and other media. Given my Chronicle work, I’ll refrain from any GetReligion posts related to Churches of Christ or other streams of the Stone-Campbell Movement.

I look forward to spending time with you at GetReligion and joining in this important conversation. In case you can’t tell, I’m extremely excited about this opportunity — even if it doesn’t come with free hot dogs and peanuts.

Photo: That’s me interviewing NBC’s Lester Holt on faith and journalism at the “Today” studios in New York.

Surely, I was one of the last pop-culture-friendly religion writers on planet earth to get around to writing about Avatar.

To be honest with you, I didn’t want to write about the movie — especially after I saw it. I thought it was simply another James Cameron passion play about the 1960s, full of digital spectacle and vague Oprah-esque spirituality. I couldn’t even get all that worked up about the offerings by the movie’s many conservative critics, other than Ross Douthat’s analysis in the New York Times.

As it turns out, I was wrong, wrong, wrong.

Avatar actually contains some very interesting and very specific religious content.

I was clubbed over the head by this fact during an interview with Dena Ross, the Beliefnet.com entertainment editor, while I was writing a column about the site’s annual Best Spiritual Film award. As it turns out, I had missed a major concept from Hinduism during my graduate-school classes about world religions long, long ago (in a universe far, far away).

To cut to the chase, I didn’t know what the word “avatar” actually meant (other than its modern application in digital gaming). It appears that I am not alone. Anyway, that led to a Scripps Howard News Service column that opened like this:

In one of Hinduism’s most sacred poems, the lord and sustainer of the universe chooses to be incarnated in human form — the ancient term is “avatar” — to help the Pandava people fight evil invaders and defend what is right.

In director James Cameron’s blockbuster “Avatar,” a U.S. Marine is transformed by technology into a blue-skinned warrior on a planet called Pandora, where he helps the Na’vi people fight evil invaders and defend their sacred lands and traditions.

There seem to be some similarities in these epics.

“The ancient Hindu scriptures have forever reiterated that whenever the world would be on the brink of disaster and mankind faces extinction … the divine Lord Vishnu would manifest himself in mortal, palpable form to save mankind from the impending doomsday,” noted the Bengali director Sudipto Chattopadhyay, at the Passion and Cinema weblog.

When evaluating Cameron’s movie, he added, one thing is clear. “The use of the word Avatar hence could never be an accident. The Avatar is meant to be the savior, the messiah of his own race and people.”

Obviously, I had a blind spot when — notebook in hand — I went to the theater to see this megahit movie. Ross (and Google) helped me realize my limitations and learn something new about an important concept.

By the way, I urge you to check out that Chattopadhyay essay. To me, it seems highly unlikely that Cameron was simply dabbling in some vague symbolism when he was making this movie.

All in all, this has to be considered an unusually faith-based year at the multiplex. This week, the Religion & Ethics Weekly team at PBS did a discussion-starter piece — click here for the page with two videos — on this topic for the show’s website. The producer for the segment saw my Scripps Howard piece and I ended up being part of the trio of voices featured in the pre-Oscar discussion.

So check that out. Then, let’s open this thread up, in the final hours before the red carpet. Any comments on the role of religion and spirituality in the important films this year? Any comments on the press coverage of these themes? Please share some URLs with us.

I was all set to make this a “Got news?” post. I had been reading rumblings about an upcoming Presbyterian Church (USA) report in the religious and conservative press, but nothing in the mainstream media. Here’s a sample religious media report and here’s a bit from the conservative Weekly Standard:

Six years ago, the nearly 3 million member Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) became the first and only U.S. religious body to adopt a divestment policy against Israel. After a large uproar from Christians and Jews, including a personal appeal from Presbyterian former CIA Director James Woolsey at the church’s General Assembly in 2006, the divestment stance was repealed.

Controversy over the church’s stance towards Israel may now reignite. A special PCUSA study committee is proposing that the denomination’s 2010 General Assembly take a strident anti-Israel, pro-Palestinian stance. The committee’s report points to the Israeli presence on the West Bank as the great evil in the Middle East. It urges the United States to “employ the strategic use of influence and the withholding of financial and military aid to enforce Israel’s compliance” with demands for withdrawal. The committee recommends no similar pressure against any other actors in the region.

It was five years ago that tmatt noted that the media didn’t seem terribly interested in stories about mainline denominations and their relationship with or stance on Israel. And the trend toward divestment and other measures seemed possibly to be fading.

So I thought this report made a perfect Got news? feature. That’s where we highlight stories that appear on opinion pages even though they’re breaking news. And if you do a Google News search, it seems all the hits come from opinion sources or religious media.

But the reason why this doesn’t make a great example of that is because there is a mainstream report that covers the issue. And it comes from the Louisville Courier-Journal’s Peter Smith, who does excellent work covering the Presbyterian Church (USA), which is headquartered there.

His story is very balanced, very nuanced. He notes that the report has harsh words for Israel and that the denomination is trying to handle public relations a bit better this time by issuing letters to Jews, Christians and Muslims living in both the United States and Israel:

The report released Friday proclaims “in no uncertain terms: we support the existence of Israel as a sovereign nation within secure and recognized borders.”

Yet it decries Israel’s 43-year-old occupation of Palestinian lands, the building of a separation barrier around and through Palestinian territories and the increasing radicalization of Israeli settlers in the territories.

In a letter to Palestinians, the report uses the term “nakba,” often translated as catastrophe, which Arabs have used to decry the creation of Israel and subsequent war. “From 1948, we have made our stance clear on the unjust situation of Palestinian refugees since the Nakba. Your experience is one of displacement; as a people of faith.”

I have absolutely no doubt that Smith will continue to cover this story well, including whatever fallout comes from within the denomination and other communities. He also does a good job of providing background information at the paper’s religion blog.

It’s official. Catholicism has little or nothing to do with the giant, heartrending story here inside the other Beltway — the closing of 13 of 64 schools in the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Baltimore.

As you would expect, the Baltimore Sun once again played this as a giant story when Archbishop Edwin F. O’Brien made the long-rumored news official, which is perfectly understandable. It is a huge story for all kinds of people here in Charm City, not just Catholics. As the coverage has made plain, many of these dying Catholic schools contain few, if any, Catholics. They have, however, been serving as an alternative to the city’s public schools, especially for families of color seeking an alternative approach to education — one that includes some emphasis on faith and stricter forms of discipline. That’s a theme woven into these Sun stories.

As I emphasized the other day (click here for a flashback) the newspaper is playing this story as a mix of blend of economics and the mysterious decline of crucial aspects of Catholic life in post-1960s America.

Here’s the crucial passage in the update. Is there an echo in here?

The challenges confronting the archdiocese mirror those faced by Catholic education in urban areas from the Midwest to the Northeast. In the decades since the peak enrollments of the 1960s, the thinning of the ranks of low-paid teaching nuns and brothers has forced schools to hire more expensive professional staff, ending the era of free or nearly free Catholic education. While tuitions were rising, Catholics were fleeing the cities for the suburbs, leaving behind lower-income families who could ill afford the expense.

In Baltimore, about a third of archdiocesan classrooms are empty. Elementary and middle schools have lost 20 percent of their enrollment since the 2001-2002 school year. Since then, the archdiocese — which includes Baltimore, surrounding counties and Western Maryland — has closed 16 of its schools.

Once again, let me stress that the flight to the suburbs is a major factor in this story, as is the decline of many old neighborhoods with deep roots into “old country” European lands. However, once again, the coverage avoids any input from Catholics — on the doctrinal left or right — who have other reasons to criticize Baltimore schools.

Here is the basic question: Where did the Catholic students and the teaching sisters, brothers and priests go? If declining numbers are crucial in this story, what are the other factors at work in this drama?

GetReligion readers have raised other important questions: Have the truly committed traditional Catholics, to a large degree, switched to homeschooling? Why have they done so? Are there some Catholics schools — in or near the city — that have been thriving while others decline? What, for example, is going on at this once declining school?

While reading this package, especially the parts emphasizing the athletics legacy at Cardinal Gibbons High School, another question came to mind: What would happen if you did a chart showing how many vocations — priests, brothers and sisters — have been produced by each of the city’s Catholic schools (those closing and those remaining open) during, oh, the past two decades? Would any patterns emerge? I know Catholic schools used to watch these statistics closely. Is this still true?

Toward the end of the main story, the Sun includes some interesting details that hint at some of the other cultural trends that have shaped this event. In the comments thread on my earlier post, the subject of Latino Catholics came up. Read the following carefully, focusing on the archdiocese’s recovery plan for its school system:

The plan calls for expanding tuition assistance across the archdiocese. The aid is now chiefly made available in the city.

The plan emphasizes a renewed commitment to the Catholic character of instruction, while recommending that the system expand its program offerings. Proposals include opening a new dual-language elementary school, doubling to four the number of schools offering programs for students with learning disabilities, and establishing a concentration in science, technology, engineering and math at four elementary schools. One elementary school would adopt a Montessori education approach for students ages 3-6.

School administration could also be reformed under a recommendation to give the superintendent, with advice from that school’s individual governing board, greater authority to hire and fire principals, who in many schools now answer to the local pastor.

Lots to think about, with little of it linked to Catholics and their faith. I guess that is the big, big, big ghost in this sad story about Catholic schools in the city that I call home.

Apparently missing from “The New York Times Guide to Essential Knowledge”, and from the pop culture background of the paper’s music critics, editors and copy editors, is any perspective about the pervasiveness of Christian artists in the annals of popular music.

I offer as my test sample this review of Danny Gokey’s new album, “My Best Days.” Generally, of course, the review by Joe Caramanica is well written and leaves me with an adequate sense of the quality of this album.

Caramanica finds Gokey, another former worship leader who attained national mainstream fame on “American Idol,” in an awkward position — and struggling to make it work. This line is wonderfully descriptive:

“My Best Days,” his debut album, is for better and for worse Christian pop squeezed into Wranglers.

But there is one section of this capsule review, right near the top, that should hang up not just Christian music connoisseurs but really anyone who has even casually followed pop culture comings and goings during the past two decades:

There are no shortage of Christian pop and rock stars, but none have crossed over to the mainstream since Amy Grant in 1991.

Really? Only Amy Grant? No one else has broken through since “Baby Baby?”

A few other names come to mind. Switchfoot. MxPx. P.O.D. Lifehouse. Jars of Clay. MercyMe.

But those are artists who not only “crossed over” but had major mainstream success. If we just want to talk about “crossover” Christian artists, the list — what? — doubles or triples. I’m not even sure, but Caramanica’s comment falls really flat.

PHOTO: You can be a Christian rockstar too

Okay, so we’ve already looked at some other coverage of DC’s new law permitting same-sex marriage. A few readers sent an early version of the following story, which has been improved with an update later in the day. It’s about how the former chief operating officer of DC Catholic Charities vehemently disagrees with Archbishop Donald Wuerl’s decision to cancel new spousal benefits for employees of Catholic Charities. The move was made so that the church could comply with both DC law and church doctrine. We discussed previous coverage here and here.

The story is about the criticism from Tim Sawina, the former executive of the agency, so it naturally revolves around what he said and his perspective.

[B]y eliminating such benefits, Sawina said, Catholic Charities is driving current employees to look for jobs elsewhere, handicapping the group’s recruitment efforts and losing the respect of the D.C. community.

“Some, including the archbishop, have argued that by providing health care to a gay or lesbian spouse we are somehow legitimizing gay marriage,” said Sawina, a former priest. “Providing health care to a gay or lesbian partner — a basic human right, according to Church teaching — is an end in itself and no more legitimizes that marriage than giving communion to a divorced person legitimizes divorce, or giving food or shelter to an alcoholic legitimizes alcoholism.”

I think this is a great quote to include. It’s specific and pointed and intriguing. And, I figured, not an accurate portrayal of the Church’s position. I mean, I’m not entirely sure since the criticism is written in a somewhat confusing manner. For one thing, the issue isn’t provision of health care but, rather, a health care benefits package. And while the church does teach that health care is a fundamental right, I don’t think that means the church believes that Catholic Charities must provide health care insurance to an ailing sibling or live-in lover of an employee.

Further, I assume the church considers the administration of the sacrament to people (including those who have obtained civil divorces) to be a wholly different matter than how one of its charities handles employee benefits. And the fact that the church won’t commune Catholics who have obtained a civil divorce and remarried doesn’t really support Sawina’s position. I mean, my understanding of the Catholic Church’s teaching is that they basically don’t recognize civil divorce and consider it almost like a separation — the church considers the marriage still valid and only withholds communion if you caused the divorce and are publicly unrepentant about it, or you remarried or some other problem arises. And as for the help offered to alcoholics in need, I don’t know — I’d love to hear what Wuerl or other Catholics who support his decision have to say. So what do they say? We’ll look at how the Post described the Archdiocese’s response to Sawina’s objections in a second. But I was really curious when I read the story so I put a Twitter APB out at 11:00 last night and wrassled up a couple of Catholics who indeed had quick responses to Sawina’s letter. Here’s a tiny bit from one GetReligion reader:

The right to health care is basic, but the means by which that right is secured must be a matter of practical ethical reasoning. This means there is no one-size-fits-all method, and the provision of health care cannot violate other moral basics.

From my Catholic standpoint, affirming homosexual relationships would undermine sexual morality and cause scandal and confusion among the faithful — all of which are unjust acts.

There’s more, but I only quote to show that there are specific responses to explain Wuerl’s reasoning.

So how did the Post describe the archdiocese’s doctrinal views?

The archdiocese responded to Sawina’s letter Thursday, calling it an inaccurate portrayal of the Church’s position and saying that his appeal to the organization’s board of directors would have no effect, because the board can’t overturn the archbishop’s decision.

Yeah. Um. Thank you, reporters, for telling us that the archdiocese disagrees with the letter. That’s something we could have figured out on our own, probably. But what we could use some help with is learning a bit about why they view this as an inaccurate portrayal of the Church’s position. I threw out some ideas above but I’m not Catholic and I could be all wet. But there are tens of millions of Catholics in the country. Many live here in this archdiocese. And many of them can explain the church’s position or otherwise respond to Sawina. There’s really just no excuse for not including a rebuttal from … anyone.

Instead we get a lot of political discussion instead of answering basic questions. It’s a highly negative piece about the Catholic Church. For instance, chunks of Sawina’s letter are quoted where he complains that staff will be looking to leave. And I was thinking about how it would be interesting to hear from the archdiocese about whether they consider the needs of those they help or the needs of the staff to be more important when making a decision about whether to continue attempting to operate in the District. Or how they make decisions.

I’m going to be a bit dramatic here but just to make a point. The narrative on this story could be framed as one where the Catholic Church is doing everything in its power to be able to continue serving the poor here in DC against an oppressive government crackdown on religious freedom — even changing its benefits structure so that it won’t be in violation of church teaching. Instead, it’s basically framed as a choice that the Archbishop decided to make so as to mess with gays. The power to frame a story is huge and largely unseen by readers.

Finally, let’s look at this section:

One employee provided by Catholic Charities this week agreed to be named. Michelle Mendez, staff attorney for immigrant legal services, also described dismay about the spousal benefit reduction but said she remained committed to the organization’s work and mission.

Here’s what she actually said. I’m getting this from the previous day’s story:

“I disagree with it on a personal level,” she said. “I think it’s unfortunate to cut off benefits and worry about the effect it may have on employees’ families. But on a public level, I understand how hard the decision was and where the organization is coming from.”

As a Catholic believer, she said the church needs to keep to its tenets. But as an employee who might marry sometime and need health insurance for a spouse, she wishes the option were still there. “But at the end of the day, the reason we work at a place like this is to make a difference,” she said. “As long as we can continue doing that, that’s what’s most important.”

With all of this in mind, let’s look at how the story ends:

[Spokeswoman Susan] Gibbs said that the archdiocese is not surprised that workers expressed discouragement but blamed it in part on media coverage of the issue.

“Part of the problem is that they’re coming in hearing this stuff every day — not all of it accurate — about the organization they work at,” she said. “It’s been a tough few months for all of us. It was a hard decision but one that allows us to continue the important work we’re doing.”

I’ve got to say that Gibbs has a point.

In honor of the upcoming Oscar bash, let me jump in here with another post on the mainstream media coverage of the religious element in “The Blind Side.”

In a way, I am making yet another attempt to praise the insightful and nuanced coverage that the film has been given in the Los Angeles Times, among other places. Of course, I took a shot at the topic early on, writing a column about the film for Scripps Howard News Service.

The basic idea, once again, is that Hollywood wasn’t scared of this movie because of its respectful portrayal of a conservative, white, evangelical family (although Sandra Bullock has said that freaked her out a bit, at first). After all, this isn’t a “Christian movie.” It’s a movie, by a mainstream Hollywood director who happens to be a Christian, about a Christian family trying to live out its faith.

Now, the subtle issue connected with the film is that, in an age of niche audiences, The Blind Side was a movie that was meant to appeal to all kinds of people — black and white, male and female, football fans and people who carry tissues to theaters and expect to use them. And then there was the appeal to people in pews.

But it was clear that the movie did freak out some people, although fewer of them put their acidic thoughts into newsprint than I expected.

Then a GetReligion reader send me the following link from the other side of the Atlantic. Holy paranoia! This was the real deal and, if even half of this was voiced inside corner offices in lofty places in mass-media land, it’s amazing the movie got made at all.

This is from the Sunday Times and, after reading this headline, you just know you are in for a hathotic treat:

Sarah Palin takes on Hollywood

Fans of the politician are flocking to Sandra Bullock’s homespun film The Blind Side, and it’s heading for Oscar success

Ready to read the opening of this news essay?

If there’s anything Hollywood appreciates less, or fears more, than the inexorable rise of Sarah Palin, it’s the success of the movie The Blind Side. Heading into the Oscars, Avatar may be the techno-wow box-office behemoth, The Hurt Locker the critically acclaimed scrapper, but it’s The Blind Side that has truly blindsided the film industry. To the head-scratching consternation of West Coast movie execs, God-fearing “red state” Americans in their millions have been storming cinemas to see it. The film cost just $35m, has taken nearly $250m since the end of November and is a shock smash hit.

Based on a true story, The Blind Side stars Sandra Bullock as Leigh Anne Tuohy, a wealthy supermom who saves a homeless black teenager from a life of almost certain crime and crack, turning him into a star American-football player. She does it with the ramrod power of her Christian faith, taking him into her prayerful family. There, she stuffs him with copious amounts of fast food — her husband, Sean, played by the country singer Tim McGraw, owns a number of Taco Bell franchises — and outsize servings of the American Dream. And just as Julia Roberts sported a push-up bra for added sexual frisson in Erin Brockovich, Bullock’s bum-hugging pencil skirts and hunky husband hint that prayer may not be the only reason she gets on her knees.

Yes, you read that right.

Ready for some more political insights about this movie? Hang on. George W. Bush has a starring role in this horror story. And some terrified movie executives have decided that it’s good to make risk-averse and make movies lots of people want to see.

Some fans even attribute the unlikely success of The Blind Side to the miraculous power of faith. After being rejected by two big studios, which were scared off by its badge-wearing proselytizing, The Blind Side was eventually financed by a company backed by Fred Smith, the owner of FedEx — a Republican, a college friend of George W. Bush and a supporter of John McCain’s presidential bid.

So, what’s really going on here? Flummoxed film executives and hapless agents are doing their damnedest not to look too terrified at what it all portends. Where companies such as Miramax once offered moviegoers challenging alternative fare, Hollywood — ravaged by a drastic fall in DVD revenues and the almost complete collapse of the independent distribution business — is becoming increasingly conservative and risk-averse. Could the success of The Blind Side, they whisper, be the ultimate trumpet blast at the precarious walls of their Californian Jericho? Mrs. Palin Comes to Hollywood? “The Blind Side isn’t alienating because it’s a movie about an insulated conservative family — it’s alienating because it so tediously chirps their Bush-era conservative values,” one reviewer snipped, echoing the feelings of many Hollywood insiders.

Pop some popcorn and read it all.

One more thing: Could someone who has seen the movie offer a specific example of a scene in which there is “proselytizing” on behalf of conservative Christianity, as in a scene that attempts to evangelize people in the audience who are part of another faith group? I’m actually curious about that line in this masterwork.

Photo: The real Michael Oher and his extended family, during his days at Ole Miss.