I was reading this Washington Post story about how “some” Muslims don’t want to fill out U.S. Census forms for fear of how the federal government will use that information.

The story isn’t terribly well sourced and doesn’t really quantify how widespread this concern is among Muslims (beyond, again, “some” and, later, “many”) and I thought it might be confusing religious issues with immigration or residency concerns. But what I found most interesting about the story, which brought up past problems with the federal government violating civil liberties in the name of combating terrorism, was that it repeatedly mentioned the Dar Al-Hijrah Islamic Center in Falls Church, Va., without mentioning some of the mosque’s ties to terrorists.

It’s a very popular mosque in the area but it’s also known for having once had an imam by the name of Anwar al-Awlaki. Yes, that Anwar al-Awlaki. Two of the 9/11 hijackers attended services there and a German planner of the 9/11 attacks had the number for the mosque in his apartment. Ft. Hood shooter Nidal Hasan also attended there years ago. Ahmed Omar Abu Ali, who was convicted of conspiracy to assassinate President George W. Bush and of providing support to Al Qaeda, worshiped and taught Islamic studies there. A former member of the mosque’s executive committee was convicted of obstruction of justice for refusing to testify about Hamas. Jeffrey Goldberg wrote that mosque leaders have been political (he quotes from one 1998 sermon: “Allah will give us the victory over our tyrannical enemies in our country. Allah, the infidel Americans and British are fighting against you. Allah, the curse of Allah will become true on the infidel Jews and on the tyrannical Americans.”). And the Post has reported that the mosque is affiliated with the Muslim American Society, which has links to the Muslim Brotherhood. Dar Al Hijrah hosted a fundraiser last month for Sabri Benkahla, who members believe was wrongly convicted of terrorism-related charges.

Now, I certainly don’t think you need to mention any or all of this every time you write about the mosque. But if you’re writing about terrorism and you’re writing about the mosque? Then you probably should. Not all mosques are like the Dar Al Hijrah mosque. And if reporters obscure those distinctions, I think it might have the effect of making all Muslims seem more radical as a group.

Anyway, I wasn’t going to write anything about this larger topic of how to handle Dar Al Hijrah’s controversial ties but then I saw this brief Washington Post Virginia Politics blog post by Anita Kumar. It explains that hundreds of people are asking the House of Delegates there to revoke an invitation to a Falls Church imam. We’re told they accuse him of condoning violence. The delegate who invited him defends him as “a great guy.” We get almost no specifics.

I know it’s just a blog post but what, precisely, are the things Abdul-Malik is accused of? I know that some people aren’t happy about that fundraiser for the guy who was convicted of terrorism-related charges. But I also know that much of the other stuff I mentioned above predated Abdul-Malik’s tenure at the controversial mosque.

So the Post has a follow-up story, a great opportunity to clarify some of these mysteries. Here’s how it begins:

Hundreds of people are urging legislators to boycott the House of Delegates’ floor session on Thursday, when a Falls Church imam whom they accuse of condoning violence and defending terrorism is set to deliver the opening prayer.

The imam, Johari Abdul-Malik, and many other leaders in the Muslim and interfaith communities say the accusations are false.

It goes on to include one sentence about how 9/11 hijackers worshiped there and Al Awlaki was the imam there. It doesn’t mention much of what the Post itself has reported over the years about ties to accused and convicted terrorists. And then it transitions:

But Abdul-Malik was not affiliated with the mosque in 2001, when the Sept. 11 attacks occurred. In recent years, he has made statements following the arrest of Muslims on terrorism charges, arguing for due process, civil rights and fair sentencing.

“To try to cast me as someone who’s a terrorist and closed-minded — they picked the wrong guy,” he said.

Evidence also supplied in Abdul-Malik’s favor include that he was featured in ads denouncing terrorism and has condemned Osama bin Laden on “The O’Reilly Factor.” Note, above, the use of the word “but.” Now note how the next paragraph begins:

Still, letters and calls have poured into legislative offices since Friday, when a handful of concerned delegates let community activists know that Abdul-Malik was coming to Richmond.

“He’s an apologist for people who commit criminal acts,” said James Lafferty, chairman of the Virginia Anti-Shariah Task Force. The group, along with the Traditional Values Coalition and Act for America, will hold a rally outside the state Capitol on Thursday morning.

Unbelievably, though, we never get to hear the specific allegations made by critics of Abdul-Malik and the Dar Al Hijrah moseque. I mean, you can easily find them on the internet — but you can’t find them in this story. Again, I know the fundraiser they hosted last month really bothered some people. But it’s not mentioned in the story. Are there other things that critics are upset about? If so, we don’t learn about them from the Post article.

Completely apart from the merits of either side’s case, this story goes out of its way to find supporters and defenders of Abdul-Malik. That’s fine and good but because we never hear the specifics of critics’ complaints, it’s just a very one-sided story. It’s even worse than not giving the specifics. The reporters actually tell us that the terrorist connections at the mosque predate the current imam. But at least some of the (apparently-too-hot-for-the-Post) complaints they have about the mosque and its imam are quite recent.

Here is a question for GetReligion readers and other consumers of mainstream news. Does the name “James Pouillon” ring any bells for you?

There’s a chance that it will, since this was the man who was gunned down last September as he sat, in his wheelchair, protesting against abortion in front of Owosso High School in Michigan. GetReligion readers will remember this strange, Associated Press Style-bending headline from that time: “Anti-Abortionist Shot to Death In Front of School.”

As I asked back then, “What, pray tell, is an anti-abortionist? Someone who is opposed to abortionists?” The normal style these days is “anti-abortion” and “pro-abortion rights.”

Suffice it to say that cultural conservatives wanted to know why Pouillon’s death received a fair amount of coverage, but nothing resembling the waves of ink that greet any acts of violence that take part on the other side of the issue. Meanwhile, some voices on the cultural left described Pouillon in the wildest possible terms — sample, here — and noted, accurately, that he was the kind of man who inspired strong emotions among a wide variety of people.

However, this was an important story for many readers. However, it appears that editors at the New York Times did not think that the resolution of this case was worth much attention. Here is the newspaper’s report on the verdict. This is the whole story, minus the generic AP credit line:

Michigan: Trucker Guilty in Killings

A jury in Shiawassee County convicted a trucker of first-degree murder Thursday in the shootings of an abortion protester and a businessman, rejecting claims that the gunman could not be held criminally responsible because he was mentally ill at the time. The trucker, Harlan Drake, 34, faces life in prison in the killings of James Pouillon, 63, and Mike Fuoss, 61, in Owosso in September.

Now that is one gripping headline that pulls you into the heart of the story.

For a more complete account of the trial, check out this Associated Press report. As always, there are complex elements to the crime. How ever, there is no question that Drake shot Pouillon because his in-your-face protests against abortion had offended the trucker’s mother. Thus, we read:

Assistant Prosecutor Sara Edwards said Drake’s mother, Kim Staples, expressed “growing displeasure” with Pouillon the day before the shooting because children could see his sign.

“The defendant decided if Mr. Pouillon was in front of that high school on September 11th, he was going to kill him,” Edwards told the jury. “He told detectives if Mr. Pouillon was there he was going to make sure he wasn’t going to be there again.”

As for Fuoss, Staples was his former employee, and Drake believed he had not treated his mother well, the prosecutor said.

In other words, this was not a random killing by an angry trucker.

Not that you would know that from scanning the briefs in the nation’s newspaper of record.

Joel Osteen is “the new face of Christianity.” That breaking religion news out of Houston — published 4,845 miles away in London — arrives courtesy of a 3,800-word profile in The Observer, which boldly declares:

If anybody is the face of evangelical Christianity in America today, it is Joel Osteen.

Not just that, but Osteen is “America’s pastor.” As the story’s main deck headline explains:

Forget Billy Graham and Jimmy Swaggart — the most popular and influential pastor in the U.S. is Joel Osteen.

Oh, and by the way, Ronald Reagan is no longer U.S. president. If you’re wondering where The Observer got its scoop on Osteen’s rise to preeminence in American evangelicalism, I couldn’t tell you. The reporter doesn’t bother to attribute that “fact” to anyone. It’s just assumed.

As for me, I evidently don’t have the same expert sources as this writer because my first thought was: What about that other guy? You know, the guy who hosted a presidential debate — er, forum — at his church in 2008.

Strangely enough, The Observer piece does mention Rick Warren, so it appears this reporter has heard of him. But Warren merits none of the hyperbolic adjectives reserved for the story’s star. Rather, Warren plays a bit role as a critic of Osteen’s “prosperity gospel” focus:

Many evangelicals despise the doctrine. Rick Warren, the California megapastor who gave the invocation at (President Barack) Obama’s inauguration, told Time magazine: “This idea that God wants everybody to be wealthy? There is a word for that: baloney. It’s creating a false idol. You don’t measure your self-worth by your net worth. I can show you millions of faithful followers of Christ who live in poverty. Why isn’t everyone in the church a millionaire?”

I know I shouldn’t take a British newspaper report too seriously, and really, I’m not.

For entertainment value alone, this story is worth the read. Yes, it cultivates mostly well-plowed ground. But in recounting the high and low points of Osteen’s biography and the “vast, thrumming God-machine” that is Lakewood Church in Houston, it intersperses tons of colorful, often humorous anecdotes.

This megachurch-sized paragraph is typical:

Three enormous video screens advertise church groups such as Griefshare: From Mourning to Joy and the Freedom Series. But just as I’m wondering what the Quest for Authentic Manhood involves, the house worship band kicks out the jams. It’s 11am exactly and the day’s second service has begun. The stage is dominated by an enormous revolving golden globe, in front of which is a rock orchestra flanked on either side by a multiracial gospel choir. Meanwhile, no fewer than nine lead singers are dancing about the stage, praising the Lord. And as if the stage isn’t busy enough, down on the floor a small army of serious-looking men dressed in black suits stands alert, ever watchful, communicating with each other through radio mics. Theoretically they’re church ushers, but they look more like secret service men guarding a president. Gently but firmly they guide latecomers to their seats, leaving nothing to chance, as if one wrong step could upset the delicate balance that keeps 16,000 evangelical Christians from erupting into violence and anarchy.

Still, I couldn’t resist asking a few expert observers for their take on Osteen’s place in the imaginary evangelical hierarchy.

Reaction No. 1 came from Shaun Casey, a professor of Christian ethics at Wesley Theological Seminary in Washington, D.C. He coordinated evangelical outreach efforts for Obama’s 2008 campaign. His take:

Joel Osteen is one of a thousand faces of evangelical Christianity today. To be sure, many of those thousands would kill all the others for the title “the indisputable face,” but alas, evangelicals are like feral cats: They are not organized around a single leader, and they do not answer, nor have they ever answered, to a single voice. Anyone with more than 10 minutes of experience in the evangelical world would laugh at the notion there is one indisputable leader among the multitude of aspirants to that title.

Um, good thing that British reporter didn’t contact Casey. I don’t think it would have helped his storyline.

Reaction No. 2 came from Bill Leonard, dean and church history professor at Wake Forest University School of Divinity in Winston-Salem, N.C. His take:

No, Joel Osteen is not the indisputable face of evangelical religion. In fact, many evangelicals dispute his place in their movement, suggesting that he is “soft on sin” or more of a Christian motivational speaker.

My overall assessment is that given diversity and pluralism in American religion, even evangelical religion, there are many “faces” of American evangelicalism today. It depends on the subgroup with which folks most identity.

Again, whew! Maybe that British reporter knew what he was doing by avoiding expert opinions.

Or maybe he’s just as clueless — on this one point — as the article makes him appear.

Image: Wikimedia Commons

It’s been two months since Haiti was rocked by a catastrophic earthquake, and the American attention span for this humanitarian crisis is clearly waning. That’s why it’s good we have media outlets constantly reminding us that Haiti’s problems are still ever present.

I heard one of these reports on NPR’s “Morning Edition” yesterday — an exchange of letters and love from kids in Northridge, Calif., who were too young to remember that devastating quake to children in Haiti. Mandalit Del Barco tells a touching story, but it’s also one with one massive religion ghost. We’re talking Stay Puft Marshmallow Man:

Ms. STEFICA JEAN PIERRE (Student): I thank your school for the money sent to my country. I am very happy for the poem. I dont know anything about poems, but I can sing for you.

(Singing) Im so glad youre here in my life. Im so glad you came to save us. You came from heaven to earth to show the way…

DEL BARCO: I brought Steficas song and their letters back to the fifth-graders in California. They seemed impressed with the music, their stories, and the toy car.

Unidentified Child #5: Wow.

Unidentified Woman: Oh, that’s nice.

Um … NPR’s reporter might have missed something there. Stefica was singing “Lord I Lift Your Name on High.” Maybe the Petra version; who knows. But there are few possibilities here. Let’s explore:

It’s possible that Stefica feels American aid and these letters from kids in Northridge were a gift from God that saved Haitians physically and emotionally. It’s also possible that Stefica was just grateful for the California love and the first song that popped into Stefica’s head was one with the line “I’m so glad you’re in my life.” It’s also possible that Stefica was actually just expressing an appreciation for God’s grace in the midst of this tragedy.

What I love is how the recording (listen here) cuts away right as Stefica starts to go into “from the earth to the cross, my debt to pay.” The story’s transition straight from that back to Northridge leaves us with no answers about why Stefica chose this song. It’s not like Stefica picked “Empire State of Mind,” so I’m guessing there was a reason other than wanting to sing a Billboard-charting tune.

The song’s appearance reminds me of a scene from “Seinfeld” when George wants to tell his girlfriend he loves here. Jerry asks about the likelihood that George’s girlfriend will respond with an “I love you too.” Fifty-fifty.

Cause if you don’t get that return, that’s a pretty big matzoh ball hanging out there.

Ditto.

Either the religious right is cozying up to the “tea party” movement or it fears it. Depending which story you read, that is. The first article to hit our mailboxes this morning was the Los Angeles Times. “Social conservatives put religious twist on ‘tea party’ message” says that activists are working together based on a shared concern over growing government.

Reporter Kathleen Hennessey begins her article by characterizing the movement using theater terminology:

For most of a year, the small-government advocates of the “tea party” movement have stolen the spotlight from the Republican Party’s veteran performers: the Christian conservatives who have long driven voters to the polls for the GOP.

Now the veterans are stealing the tea partyers lines.

In news releases, mission statements and interviews, prominent social conservatives increasingly are using the small-government rhetoric popular with the tea party activists and long used by economic conservatives — but with a religious bent.

The rhetorical “shift” is evidence of how potent the growth of government is as a galvanizing issue on the right, she says. Now, I know that during the previous administration, social conservatives adopted a lot of the “compassionate conservatism” talk and its attendant increase in the size and scope of government but the article probably should have mentioned that this supposedly new rhetoric sounds very similar to what social conservatives have said during the 1980s and 1990s, at least.

In fact, as I was reading this article I kept thinking of how Grover Norquist has always said how the right should bill itself: The Leave Us Alone Coalition. And a few paragraphs into the article, we get this quote:

“The reason why social conservatives and economic conservatives can play well together … is the guy who wants to go to church all day just wants to be left alone. So does the guy who wants to play with his gun all day, and the guy who wants to make money all day,” said Grover Norquist, president of Americans for Tax Reform. “They don’t agree on how to spend their time, but they do agree on their central issue: They want to be left alone.”

Again, this is not a new formation. Norquist was talking about it at least 10 years ago.

Anyway, the piece shows how social conservatives are still active and effective (see: fight over federal funding of abortion in the health care bill) but also notes that social issues seem to be taking a back seat to constitutional principles and government spending.

Okay, now let’s go over to Politico where we learn that “Tea parties stir evangelicals’ fears.” It kind of does the same thing that the Times did — it throws out a possible narrative and then just includes lots of quotes from people who are trying to push that narrative. It just turns out that they happened to pick competing narratives.

Or maybe it just indicates some belated but necessary attempts by the media to get a handle on what’s driving the change in political moods. One of my favorite things about the competing narratives, by the way, is that they use the same picture for both stories!

One of the trickiest words in all of journalism is “unprecedented.”

Consider the top of this Lenten story in The Boston Globe:

In an effort to get the reluctant faithful back to confession, the Archdiocese of Boston is launching an unprecedented campaign — called “The Light Is On For You” — using radio spots and a website to promote special confessional hours in nearly 300 parishes during Lent.

But the church faces an uphill battle: Three-quarters of American Catholics either don’t participate in confession at all, or go less than once a year. In the Boston area, more than 80 percent of Catholics don’t even attend church regularly. … According to canon law, one should confess at least annually, and the first confession is made at age 7. …

The days of long lines at confessionals are gone for a variety of reasons. Saturday afternoon hours are inconvenient for many families. Many parishioners and priests take a more liberal view of sin and forgiveness these days. Some parishioners feel they can pray directly to God for absolution. Others feel they don’t need a priest as they unload to therapists, co-workers, and Facebook friends.

Whatever you think of the doctrinal issues involved, this is a huge story and one that has received very little news coverage — especially in light of the fact that it represents a redefinition of the primary sacrament of the ancient Christian faith.

Say what? Yes, for centuries Christians believed that there was a direct link between confession and the act of receiving the Eucharist. Is this simply a fussy theological detail? I don’t know. Ask Rep. Patrick Kennedy and some other postmodern Catholics about that.

The problem with the word “unprecedented” in the lede is that the campaign is new in Boston, but not elsewhere. I’ve been reading and writing about these kinds of campaigns throughout the past decade. All the lede had to do was saying that the Boston archdiocese was “joining” in an ongoing campaign, rather than saying it was “launching” an unprecedented campaign. This effort is new in Boston, in other words. It is not new — period.

Later on, the Globe does make this clear.

The new initiative, which started last month on Ash Wednesday, follows a similar program in Washington, D.C., and other cities, and will be repeated each Advent and Easter at all churches in the Boston Archdiocese.

Priests are available every Wednesday from 6:30 to 8 p.m., with the last night for the Lenten season on March 31. Though the traditional confessional boxes remain, where the priest sits behind a screen and the confession is anonymous, parishioners may also make an appointment with a priest to confess face to face in the rectory or a “reconciliation room,” designed for such encounters.

The story deals with part of the central issue — which is the fact that American Catholics now have a few of sin and confession that is, essentially, Protestant. The story shows that, but never does the theological math.

And what about those pre-Vatican II Catholics? It is clear that older Catholics — who still go to confession, as a rule — have a different understanding of the faith than the post-Vatican II generations. But what is the essential difference here? What happened at the time of Vatican II, and after that seismic event?

The story is, for the most part, silent on that.

The biggest problem is that the story never explains the doctrinal link between confession and taking part in the Mass. While millions of Catholics no longer belief that they literally need to go to confession every week, before receiving Holy Communion, it is clear that the Catholic church continues to say that a link is there, one with eternal consequences. Weekly confession is no longer the norm, but never going to confession is not an option. You can look it up.

This is especially true during the 40-day season of Lent that leads up to Easter.

Why do so few Catholics go to confession during this pivotal season, before the most holy day on the Christian calendar? Several years ago, a priest here in Washington — Father William H. Stetson of the Catholic Information Center near the White House — put it this way, when I asked him precisely that question:

The biggest problem … is that so many Catholics no longer think of themselves as sinners.

“There are all kinds of actions that the church teaches are seriously sinful that the typical modern Catholic no longer believes are seriously sinful,” said Stetson, who, as a 75-year-old priest, has seen many changes sweep through the Church of Rome. “Therefore, these typical Catholics walk up to the altar week after week to receive Communion without a single thought entering their minds about repentance or confession or anything like that.

“So you have to take that into account when you talk about Lent. In a penitential season you are supposed to feel real sorrow for your sins, which can be hard to do if you really do not think that you’re sinning.”

And why has this change taken place?

Here is another piece of the puzzle — a piece that is hinted at, briefly — in the Globe article. But I ran into this view of the crisis over and over when I started researching this topic early in the past decade.

The bottom line: Look to the pulpits.

… (B)ishops and priests know that more Catholics need to go to confession. They know “The Catechism of the Catholic Church” still teaches “having attained the age of discretion, each of the faithful is bound by an obligation faithfully to confess serious sins at least once a year.”

This may come as news to millions of Catholics.

“This Easter will mark my 10th year as a Catholic,” noted one convert, in an online discussion. “I have very rarely missed Sunday mass or a holy day of obligation. Sometimes I’ve even gone to daily mass. Point is, I’ve heard well over 500 sermons. Not once — not once — do I recall having heard confession mentioned. … For most American Catholics today, confession is almost as rare and exotic a devotional practice as donning a hair shirt.”

That’s a story, a story that is much bigger than one publicity campaign in Boston.

It’s even a good story for this time of year — a season of repentance and forgiveness.

Glenn Beck’s comments about social justice last week made the blog rounds earlier this week, and the reaction has been somewhat predictable. Some ignore it; some eat it up; others are ready to condemn it. Here’s what started it all:

I beg you, look for the words ‘social justice’ or ‘economic justice’ on your church website. If you find it, run as fast as you can. Social justice and economic justice, they are code words. Now, am I advising people to leave their church? Yes! …

If you have a priest that is pushing social justice, go find another parish. Go alert your bishop and tell them, “Excuse me are you down with this whole social justice thing?” If it’s my church, I’m alerting the church authorities: “Excuse me, what’s this social justice thing?” And if they say, “yeah, we’re all in that social justice thing”—I’m in the wrong place.

Later on his TV show (left), Beck held up cards, one with a hammer and sickle and other with a swastika, and on each banner, he said, read the words ‘social justice.’

The New York Times article “Outraged by Glenn Beck’s Salvo, Christians Fire Back” makes the sweeping generalization that Christians are firing back at Glenn Beck when in reality (drumroll please) Jim Wallis is calling for a boycott. I can’t help but wonder if we’d ever see a headline like “Christian Leader Calls for Rachel Maddow Boycott.” I doubt it, but then again, a story like that wouldn’t be that shocking. Likewise, this article’s angle is predictable and falls flat. Take a look:

This week the remarks prompted outrage from several Christian bloggers. The Rev. Jim Wallis, who leads the liberal Christian antipoverty group Sojourners, in Washington, called on Christians to leave Glenn Beck.

“What he has said attacks the very heart of our Christian faith, and Christians should no longer watch his show,” Mr. Wallis wrote on his blog, God’s Politics. “His show should now be in the same category as Howard Stern.”

Reporter Laurie Goodstein mentions “several Christian bloggers” but only mentions Wallis in her story. Is it still shocking that people are “outraged” and denouncing other people in blogs (can’t anyone set one up on a whim)? Jim Wallis is noteworthy and he probably reflects how a lot of Christians feel about Beck’s comments. But social justice is what Jim Wallis is about, how he makes his living. It would’ve been more compelling to me if the reporter had also found someone less likely to come out against Beck. Tobin Grant writes at Christianity Today about conservative Christians who are comfortable with the term.

Beck’s comments came on the heels of a new six-part video small-group study, “Seek Social Justice,” put out by the Heritage Foundation, a flagship conservative organization. The video series features Chuck Colson of BreakPoint, Al Mohler of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, Sean Litton of the International Justice Mission, and other evangelical leaders speaking on the meaning and importance of social justice.

There’s a group of people worth asking about Beck’s comments. Here’s more from the Times:

In attacking churches that espouse social justice, Mr. Beck is taking on most mainline Protestant, Roman Catholic, black and Hispanic congregations in the country—not to mention plenty of evangelical churches and even his own, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

I’m not sure why she writes that most Protestant, Roman Catholic, black and Hispanic congregations espouse social justice while just “plenty” of evangelical churches espouse it. Of course, since there’s no cohesive leadership in evangelicalism like there is in Catholicism, for instance, there won’t be a general consensus on the term “social justice.” By separating evangelicals from the rest, she at least acknowledges that not everybody prefers the term “social justice,” but she never informs readers why some might hesitate to use the phrase.

The Times article gives a little bit of helpful background, but I would’ve liked to see a bit more on how the term has evolved over the years. Perhaps the story could have included someone’s definition of social justice. It seems like Beck assumes it means redistribution through government but Christians might assume a different application of the term.

Religion scholars say the term “social justice” was probably coined in the 1800s, codified in encyclicals by successive popes and adopted widely by Protestant churches in the 1900s. The concept is that Christians should not merely give to the poor, but also work to correct unjust conditions that keep people poor. Many Christians consider it a recurring theme in Scripture.

Mr. Beck himself is a convert to Mormonism, a faith that identifies itself as part of the Christian family, but is nevertheless rejected by many Christians.

The reporter should explain the end of that sentence suggesting Mormonism is “rejected by many Christians.” Remember when Focus on the Family pulled an interview over Beck’s faith? I would be curious to see if the same listeners will take their cues on church membership from Beck.

The story ends with a quote from a Mormon professor who suggests that Mormonism is all about social justice. That’s good perspective, but no one disagrees in the Mormon world?

It appears the reporter has made no effort to contact Beck for a response to the outrage he’s caused. I suppose you could argue he had his initial chance, but Sojourners wrote that Beck responded to Wallis yesterday morning (and we’ve already established that Goodstein reads the Sojourners blog).

Goodstein also wrote a post for the Caucus Blog, the Times’s politics blog. I realize that blogs are often based on work that’s already out there so I hesitate to critique them too carefully, but it reads like the longer version of the story that ended up in print. In addition to Wallis, Goodstein uses quotes from the Rev. James Martin at the Huffington Post and Joe Carter at First Things. This is all fine and good for a blog post, but I would expect a reporter to make a few more phone calls for a more solid story if she thinks outrage has been truly been prompted. I don’t think it would have been difficult to get reaction from evangelicals — black and white — who use the term social justice who may not agree with either Wallis or Beck.

I’m not sure why the Times deemed Glenn Beck’s ability to outrage people “news that’s fit to print,” but it had a potential hook, I suppose. The story could have delved into a larger question of whether groups choose to use the term “social justice” or not, what kinds of connotations it brings and what concerns they might have. The story could have also explored how, say, Catholics and evangelicals might agree on the idea of social justice but may disagree on how to pursue it.

I raise these issues because Goodstein is a respected reporter whom many religion writers emulate, and one whom we often praise. When she writes an article, people pay attention because she often writes well-reported, thoughtful pieces that raises many ideas and issues. More power to religion reporters writing on provocative issues, but I’ll be looking for deeper angles next time around.

(Cue: Audible sigh)

Your GetReligionistas have a long, long, long, oh so long history of struggling with the question of whether mainstream reporters should continue covering the staged-for-media hatefests that seem to be the only reason for the existence of the Westboro Baptist Church of Topeka, Kan.

Now there is nothing that we can do but shudder, because there are basic journalism issues that cannot be avoided in the wake of some important news here inside the DC Beltway.

Let’s look at the Washington Post, for starters:

The Supreme Court will review whether anti-gay protests at funerals of American soldiers are protected by the First Amendment, taking up the appeal of a Maryland man who won and then had reversed a $10 million verdict against the small Kansas church that conducts the demonstrations.

The case will seek to balance a group’s free speech rights with the rights of private individuals to be protected from unwanted demonstrations and defamatory remarks. A federal appeals court said the church’s protests were “utterly distasteful” but protected because they were related to “matters of public concern.” …

The funeral protest case is brought by a Maryland father whose son’s 2006 funeral in Westminster was picketed by members of the Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka, Kan. Westboro pastor Fred W. Phelps Sr. contends that the deaths of American soldiers are punishment for the nation’s tolerance of homosexuality and has organized nearly 43,000 protests since 1991, according to the church’s Web site.

Phelps and members of his church — which consists primarily of him and members of his extended family — say they were not targeting Marine Lance Cpl. Matthew Snyder, who was killed in action in Iraq. … The signs they carried at Snyder’s funeral at St. John’s Catholic Church, made in the Kansas church’s on-site sign shop, included, “God Hates the USA/Thank God for 9/11,” “Semper Fi Fags,” “Thank God for Dead Soldiers” and “Priests Rape Boys.”

America has a long and cherished history of protecting outrageous public speech and even emotionally painful public demonstrations, especially when the dispute is linked to politics, culture or public life. The most famous case would have to have been the march by neo-Nazis through the heavily Jewish Chicago suburb of Skokie, where, in the late 1970s, one out of every six Jews was a survivor or the descendant of a survivor of the Holocaust.

But we are not here to argue about the court case itself. We’re here to discuss how journalists can handle this media circus with a rare combination of accuracy, balance and perhaps even good taste. When I say balance, I mean that journalists will have to bite their lips and strive for balance when discussing the actual legal and doctrinal views linked to the Westboro case.

Why in the name of God would reporters want to wade into this church’s religious views? Well, for starters, these people insist that faith is why they do what they do (as opposed to, say, economics). To test that claim, it must be accurately discussed. Their right to free speech is directly linked to the First Amendment, by which I mean claims of free speech and religious liberty.

But there’s another reason to dig into the religious part of this story.

Note that the Post did a good job of noting that Westboro is a tiny congregation, almost a family cell group with a handful of disciples. What the story did not do, however, is stress that — like thousands of other “Baptist” flocks of all sizes — this church is totally independent from ties that bind it to any other group that calls itself “Baptist.”

Like I said a few years ago here at GetReligion:

There’s no doubt about it. The Rev. Fred Phelps of the infamous Westboro Baptist Church of Topeka, Kan., is a Baptist — because he says so.

Then again, so is Bill Clinton. So is Al Gore Jr., now that you mention it. Ditto for the Rev. Bill Moyers, Dr. Harvey Cox and the Rev. Jesse Jackson (last time I checked).

This fact must be stressed, one way or another. It would be good to start with actual quotes about the Westboro crew from Southern Baptist leaders, American Baptist leaders and representatives of the nation’s other Baptist conventions and networks. Trust me, conservative Baptists (and Conservative Baptists, too) will have plenty to say about the theology involved in this story.

Simply stated, it is wrong to hang the actions of the Westboro team around the necks of other Baptists. It would only take one or two sentences to clear this up.

Consider the following Los Angeles Times report on the Supreme Court case, which offers this tiny, insubstantial crust of information about these infamous demonstrators:

… (The) victims were the family of Marine Lance Cpl. Matthew A. Snyder, who was killed in combat in Iraq on March 3, 2006. When his family announced his funeral would be held in Westminster, Md., a Kansas preacher decided to travel there with a few followers to protest. In recent years, Fred Phelps, founder of the Westboro Baptist Church, has been protesting at military funerals around the nation because he believes the United States is too tolerant of homosexuality.

That’s it. And that simply isn’t enough information, as I am sure scores of mainstream Baptist leaders would agree.

This week we’ve seen two major stories on “gendercide.” That’s the phenomenon of some 100 million plus females having been aborted through sex selective abortion. One appears in the Christian Science Monitor and the other in The Economist.

The Economist asks the reader to imagine that they are part of a couple expecting their first child. They’re in a fast-growing, poor country but part of the new middle class. They want a small family but, most importantly, they prefer sons over daughters. Maybe it’s because they need the boy’s income. Maybe it’s because they want to pass land on and can only do that with a male heir. Perhaps they don’t want to pay a dowry. They get an ultrasound and discover they’re pregnant with a girl. What do you do? Millions of couples, we’re told, abort the daughter and try for a son. In China and northern Indian more than 120 boys are being born for every 100 girls.

For those who oppose abortion, this is mass murder. For those such as this newspaper, who think abortion should be “safe, legal and rare” (to use Bill Clinton’s phrase), a lot depends on the circumstances, but the cumulative consequence for societies of such individual actions is catastrophic. China alone stands to have as many unmarried young men—“bare branches”, as they are known—as the entire population of young men in America. In any country rootless young males spell trouble; in Asian societies, where marriage and children are the recognised routes into society, single men are almost like outlaws. Crime rates, bride trafficking, sexual violence, even female suicide rates are all rising and will rise further as the lopsided generations reach their maturity (see article).

It is no exaggeration to call this gendercide. Women are missing in their millions—aborted, killed, neglected to death. In 1990 an Indian economist, Amartya Sen, put the number at 100m; the toll is higher now. The crumb of comfort is that countries can mitigate the hurt, and that one, South Korea, has shown the worst can be avoided. Others need to learn from it if they are to stop the carnage.

The story is really interesting and there’s no doubt that many countries are dealing with problems that have arisen due to the imbalance in sex-selective abortions. But wow are there some religion ghosts. Religion plays a significant role in sex-selective abortions and infanticide and it’s not even addressed. And the discussion about improvements in South Korea is so brief as to be unhelpful. There’s no mention if religion played a role there, either.

The Christian Science Monitor looked specifically at the situation in India. Here is how it begins with a 50-year-old farmer lamenting that he no longer cares about caste, religion or looks — he just wants a wife to give him a son. Funny, isn’t it. It’s hard to find a wife to give you a son when the people of your country are killing so many of the unborn female children because they’re not sons.

But this story has the same ghosts as the previous one:

The reasons why boys are so longed for vary somewhat by region. In agricultural societies like Nandgaon, boys inherit the land. In urban India, a trend toward smaller families plays a part: Many couples who choose to have only one child want that child to be a boy.

Underlying the preference for sons is a belief that girls are liabilities who require protection and fat dowries. Though the practice of paying a husband and his family for marrying a girl was banned in 1961, dowry violence - when a woman is abused in her in-laws’ home for paying an insufficient price - is on the rise, according to nongovernmental organizations (NGOs).

There are other agricultural societies where boys inherit land that don’t have the same gender imbalance among babies who are being born. Ditto for trends toward smaller families. Does religion play a role? The only mention of religion in the piece occurs at the end:

Baljeet Singh, a 37-year-old truck driver, says he began to despair of finding a local wife once he turned 26. Men in this village, where most are farmers, consider it ideal to wed between 20 and 25. “I’m a van driver, I don’t have many prospects, and it seems that you have to have a very good job to get a bride these days,” he says.

So last year, Mr Singh used his life savings to marry a 16-year-old Muslim girl from Assam; though village rumors have it that Sonu Khutum is an illegal immigrant from Bangladesh. She is happy to be living in a predominantly Hindu village, she says, joggling the couple’s 7-month-old baby girl on her hip.

There’s quite a bit included in this brief anecdote and it shows that religious views might be a fruitful area for further exploration.

I don’t mean to shock you, but I’m about to accuse the Los Angeles Times of giving some soft news coverage — almost cheerleading — to an evangelical anti-abortion activist.

Seriously.

Just to be clear, my charge relates to a single story, so no need to fear: The Times’ well-earned renown as a publication that leans left on social issues (examples here, here and here) shall remain firmly intact. Former editor John Carroll’s famous 2003 memo on bias remains relevant, in way too many cases.

But a profile on an anti-abortion Superman who drives his motor home to poor parts of Los Angeles and saves pregnant women — physical and spiritual connotation intended — struck me as straight out of an evangelical press service.

That would be fine, of course, except that the Times is a general circulation newspaper with, one would hope, higher journalistic ideals. The top of this story:

Last year Dave Wilkinson asked God for guidance. He wanted to know what he could do to better fight abortion.

Wilkinson, an evangelical pastor, runs three Ventura County pregnancy clinics that encourage women to choose alternatives to the procedure. He believes the prevalence of abortion is the biggest test Christians face. “It’s probably one of the things that American Christians are going to have to stand before God and answer for,” Wilkinson said. “He will say, ‘You, as Americans, what did you do to fight abortion?’”

Wilkinson, a 55-year-old Simi Valley resident with a gray beard and a calm manner, said God answered his prayers with a directive to “go where the battle is.” So last September, he brought his work to Watts.

Every Tuesday since then, Wilkinson and a handful of like-minded Christians have driven into the city in a donated motor home equipped with an ultrasound machine and parked it near the Imperial Courts housing project.

Now, don’t get me wrong: I applaud the Times for telling this story and letting the activist speak for himself. It’s an interesting, newsworthy angle, and it provides a fair portrayal of a conservative Christian — something that doesn’t always happen in America’s elite newspapers.

And, in general, I don’t have many problems with the actual content in the story, which does a nice job of putting a real human face on Wilkinson and the women who show up at his mobile clinic. I do wish the reporter had dug a little deeper into Wilkinson’s religious background: I’d like to know, for example, if he attended seminary and if he’s affiliated with a particular denomination. I’d like to know how God answered his prayer: Was it a feeling? Did God speak to him directly? These type of details seem relevant in a story about religious beliefs. And, even though this isn’t GetMedical, I’d like to know what medical expertise Wilkinson and his clinics have to operate this service, and how they have addressed potential liability issues.

But my bigger concern is the lack of any real context or abortion-rights voices in this story. It’s 1,139 words, which is longer than most newspaper stories. But I think the Times stopped about 861 words short of what could have been a real meaty story. Expand this decent shell to 2,000 words, and suddenly, there’s a chance to redeem a PR-ish feature. Yes, that length is a novel in a dead-tree publication. But it’s not unheard of in a paper the caliber of the Times.

To what specifically would I allot those 861 extra words?

Glad you asked.

Mainly, this paragraph on why Wilkinson chose the Imperial Courts housing project demands more in-depth examination:

They come here because Watts is one of the city’s poorest neighborhoods, and abortion rates tend to be higher in low-income areas, according to the nonprofit Guttmacher Institute, a leading authority on sexual health issues. For four hours, Wilkinson’s group offers free pregnancy tests, using the ultrasound to show women images of their fetuses and leading prayer-filled counseling sessions in which they urge the women to keep their unborn babies.

What other options for pregnancy care and reproductive services do women in this neighborhood have? Are community and religious leaders doing enough to help these women, or is Wilkinson’s popularity a sign of a deeper problem? Are local leaders pleased with Wilkinson’s effort, or do they have concerns about it? Is this pastor proselytizing on the vulnerable or showing love to the downtrodden? What do pastors in that part of the city think?

Answer some of those questions, and this piece gets a whole lot more compelling — and a whole lot more balanced — in a hurry.

Image: Wikimedia Commons

Maybe you’ve had a bad week. You hate the melting snow, you’re recovering from a cold, maybe you hate your job. You’re ready to take it out on someone, but it would probably take more than a bad week for you to get the motivation to conspire to kill an artist in Sweden over a cartoon.

Apparently, that’s what Colleen R. LaRose, a blonde, green-eyed American from the suburbs of Philadelphia, wanted to do. The woman who called herself “JihadJane” on the Internet is linked to others who were allegedly plotting terrorist acts.

The woman is linked to seven people arrested in Ireland yesterday over a plot to kill Swedish cartoonist Lars Vilks who, in 2007, depicted the head of the prophet Mohammad on the body of a dog. That year, an Al Qaeda leader put a $100,000 bounty on Vilks’s head.

Here’s more on “JihadJane” from the Los Angeles Times.

The indictment, which also mentioned but did not identify five unindicted co-conspirators, said that LaRose first came to the attention of the FBI in June 2008 when she posted a comment on YouTube under the user name “JihadJane.” She stated that she was “desperate to do something somehow to help” Muslim people.

By December of that year, she was allegedly e-mailing one of the conspirators about her desire to become a shahed, or martyr.

A second conspirator e-mailed her in January 2009 about a similar commitment, the indictment alleges. “I tried twice but I wasn’t successful … [but] I will … try until Allah will m[a]ke it easy for me,” the conspirator told LaRose.

This is more than just a bad week. Can you guess what the story misses? Everybody say in unison: religion. We have hints here and there that she wanted to help Muslims, but there’s no exploration of whether she converted to Islam or what. A reporter talk to the neighbors who suggest she never discussed politics or plots, but did the reporter consider asking about her religious beliefs?

The New York Times report explains a little bit of her desire to help Muslims, but the story doesn’t explore her motives.

The indictment said that in mid-2008, Ms. LaRose, using the aliases JihadJane and Fatima LaRose, began posting on YouTube and other Internet sites messages about her desire to help Muslims. A MySpace profile for a woman who refers to herself as JihadJane displays pictures of bloodshed and violence in the Middle East scrawled with messages like “Palestine We Are With You” and “Sympathize With Gaza.”

By early 2009, the court papers said, she was exchanging e-mail messages with unidentified co-conspirators in Southeast Asia and Europe and expressed a desire to become a martyr for an Islamist cause.

The Guardian headline suggests that she’s a Muslim convert but doesn’t offer any proof or further explanation. Why would she kill or die for another religion? There’s no need for speculation, but do any of her internet postings reveal anything about her faith? Perhaps the police reports failed to offer clues about her faith, but reporters could indicate that a little better. Unfortunately, people often lump Muslims together as if they are one monolithic group. The more we understand which strains of thought this woman was exploring or what kinds of leaders were influencing her thinking, we can understand the story a little bit more.

Perhaps you remember the Danish newspaper cartoons of Muhammad that sparked protests in Muslim countries in 2006. In these new stories about the Swedish cartoonist, I would’ve also liked to see an explanation of why depictions of Muhammad would be so upsetting and more details about how Muslims view blasphemy. An Associated Press report about the cartoon includes one simple sentence that the other press ignored.

Islamic law generally opposes any depiction of the prophet, even favorable, for fear it could lead to idolatry.

A little explanation goes a long way. However, it’s worth exploring whether there are differences in Islam over depictions of Mohammed, as Mollie has suggested in the past when she picked up a portion of a column by Charles Moore:

There is no reason to doubt that Muslims worry very much about depictions of Mohammed. Like many, chiefly Protestant, Christians, they fear idolatry. But, as I write, I have beside me a learned book about Islamic art and architecture which shows numerous Muslim paintings from Turkey, Persia, Arabia and so on. These depict the Prophet preaching, having visions, being fed by his wet nurse, going on his Night-Journey to heaven, etc. The truth is that in Islam, as in Christianity, not everyone agrees about what is permissible.

Now if only other outlets would explore the religion element a bit further.

Sometimes, it’s amazing to see how far people will go to downplay the obvious role that religion plays in many parts of the world, for better and for worse.

Consider the recent New York Times story that ran under this headline: “Ethnic Violence in Nigeria Has Killed 500, Officials Say.”

Now, the choice of the word “ethnic” for the headline is crucial. Clearly, tribal issues played a role in this hellish story. But is the ethnic element the pivotal, defining fact in this story? Here’s the top of the report:

Officials and human rights groups in Nigeria said … that about 500 people had died in weekend ethnic violence near the central city of Jos, considerably more than what had initially been reported.

A government spokesman said … that the dead numbered more than 300. The victims were Christians killed by rampaging Muslim herdsmen, officials and human rights workers said, apparently in reprisal for similar attacks on Muslims in January.

This is a complex story and the lines between faith and blood are quite thin in the region. But the question is obvious: What about the attacks on Muslims in January? Any details available?

I know that the story has continued to develop and I will get to that. I am simply challenging the headline and the lede, that ethnicity is the defining element of this story. Later in the story, we read:

The killings took place in Plateau State near the city of Jos, for years a hotbed of ethnic and religious violence near the dividing line between the country’s mainly Christian south and Muslim north. Hundreds on both sides were killed as recently as January, though the victims this time were Christians, according to the information commissioner for Plateau, Gregory Yenlong, and a local human rights organization.

Many appeared to have been cut down with machetes after being driven from homes set ablaze by attackers in the predawn darkness, said Shamaki Gad Peter of the League for Human Rights, a Nigerian group.

Mr. Yenlong said the attackers were “hoodlums, Fulani herdsmen” — Muslims from a neighboring state, Bauchi, who were going after Christian members of Plateau’s leading ethnic group, the Berom, in the villages of Ratt and Dogo Nahawa.

“They attacked those villages and killed well over 300 people, mostly women, children and the aged,” Mr. Yenlong said. “They killed them unprovoked. Innocent people were massacred.”

I understand that it is hard to know all the details in this kind of early report. However, it’s clear that religion is a key part of this “ethnic” story.

An Associated Press follow-up story that ran in USA Today elected to use the word “sectarian” as the defining characteristic of the violence. That’s closer to the mark. The report also, as you would expect, had many more details from the scene. Here is a sample:

The killers showed no mercy: They didn’t spare women and children, or even a 4-day-old baby, from their machetes. On Monday, women wailed in the streets as a dump truck carried dozens of bodies past burned-out homes toward a mass grave.

Rubber-gloved workers pulled ever-smaller bodies from the dump truck and tossed them into the mass grave. A crowd began singing a hymn with the refrain, “Jesus said I am the way to heaven.” As the grave filled, the grieving crowd sang: “Jesus, show me the way.”

At least 200 people, most of them Christians, were slaughtered on Sunday, according to residents, aid groups and journalists. The local government gave a figure more than twice that amount, but offered no casualty list or other information to substantiate it.

The most frustrating element of all of this is that there is no clear way to establish facts in this conflict, a journalistic nightmare in which the integrity of both the regional and national government agencies (and the military) is in question. It is also clear that economic and ethnic factors are crucial. Yet, on the ground, the language and the imagery is primarily religious.

If you doubt me on that, check out this vivid report in the Wall Street Journal. The language is enough to make anyone shudder in a pew:

At a mass burial Monday in Dogo Nahawa, site of the worst violence, angry residents talked of revenge as they gathered around a large pit and scattered dirt on several dozen charred and bloodied bodies, some brought from neighboring villages. When an infant was lowered into the pit, women broke out in wails.

A village chief chastised area youth for not being ready to fight. “This is a lesson,” the chief said. “Now is the time for everyone to wake up. Elders are calling you youths to come out.”

An elderly woman prayed at the edge of the burial pit, chanting. “By God’s grace we will enter their villages and kill their women and children,” she repeated.

Horrors. Clearly it is impossible to write about this story — in a nation that is literally divided in half by religion — without dealing with the religious elements.

It is also crucial, whenever possible, to put names on these “rights groups” when they are quoted providing facts about attacks in the past and present. Some of these groups are neutral and some of them are not. We are, literally, dealing with facts and numbers that are leading to bloodshed.

Lord have mercy.

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.

Now, 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. Think of it as a small effort to balance the newspaper’s coverage on this issue, which deeply divides Americans.

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. It would not be neutral to say that, oh, Pope Benedict XVI is “sane.”

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.

OK, so now the current ombudsman has 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. This is, of course, precisely the argument made by one side in the debate that the newspaper is supposed to be covering in a balanced manner — that lesbigay status equals race.

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 isn’t “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.