“From football to faith,” the TV reporter begins, “you’ve heard that before….But this story is different. You are about to meet a former NFL player from Miami who has to be the only ultra- Orthodox Jew who wears a Super Bowl ring when he prays.”

And thus begins a lovely but superficial story on NBC6 in Miami about Alan Veingrad, a former player who helped lead the Dallas Cowboys to Super Bowl victory in 1993. In the parlance of Orthodox Jews, Veingrad became “frum.”

My friend Elli Wohlgelernter, an Israeli journalist who alerted me to the piece, found it somewhat maddening. Elli writes:

“They feign some kind of admiration, but obviously, they have no clue what being frum means, so what are they admiring? I’ll tell you - the exotic nature of Haredi Judaism. Would these reporters have done a story on a modern Orthodox Jew like you and me? Doubt it.

“But when you have a visual of a long beard juxtaposed next to a shot of a Super Bowl player - well, in TV land, it’s a no-brainer. Did they ask one in-depth question? I didn’t see it.

“I’ve met Veingrad, and he’s very serious about his religion - which is more than we can say about the TV story.”

What they do show are the externals, all described in the clever language of trades. Not only did Veingrad trade “football for faith,” he traded football pads for tefillin, his helmut for a yarmulke, Lambeau Field for the the Chabad House of Coral Springs, a place that “restored the camaraderie he lost on the football field.” Along the way, we are told, “he lost 55 pounds and added a beard.” Virutally the entire piece is shot in the synagogue, with Veingrad studying and praying. Elli adds:

“Because Vinegrad is so articulate, and speaks out often about his transformation, he could give them the great sound bites they wanted and needed, and they can make it look like a serious story.”

It not only looks like a serious story, the reporter and his anchor tell you it is at the end. “He’s the real deal,” the reporter says.

“What a great piece,” the anchor intones.

Not so fast. Even the most Orthodox Jew spends only a few hours a day in synagogue. What else does it mean to live an Orthodox life? Has it changed Veingrad’s daily routines? What about the kosher foods he eats? What about Sabbath observance? What about his relationship to his fellow man and woman?

What these reporters failed to grasp is that religious transformation runs deeper than the visuals.

Religion ghosts float in and out of news stories, good stories as well as shallow, incomplete stories. Sometimes people see the ghosts and that’s a good thing.

See here Tmatt’s examination of a funeral home trend story and the absence of religion. For a similar example of a religion ghost driving into a Major League Baseball news article, see this Atlanta Journal-Constitution story on Jordan Schafer, one of the best baseball prospects right now famous for hitting a home run in his first major league at bat.

Unfortunately, Schafer is also famous for serving a 50 game suspension for alleged human growth hormone use. Since you can’t really test for positive HGH use, it is hard to know for sure who uses it, but the accusation certainly raises questions about Schafer’s character, which the article addresses nicely.

But this is a feel-good story with good and evil floating around Schafer’s life like bumble bees on a hot summer day at the park. You never know when one might strike with a religious element:

There is no test for human growth hormone, and Schafer denies ever taking it, but he was linked to it and admitted to “hanging with the wrong people.”

“If you hang around dogs long enough, you’re going to catch fleas,’” Schafer explained.

Diaz was just the friend he needed.

Diaz is known in the Braves clubhouse for being humble and down-to-earth, with a strong Christian faith. If there was anyone to lead Schafer down the right path, this was the guy.

If you wanted to know more about the “strong Christian faith” of Braves left fielder Matt Diaz, you won’t find much about it in this article. We get some more details about the religious element that developed between Diaz and Schafer, but it is hardly developed as a meaningful aspect of the story:

They’d hit together several times a week. They played pingpong at Diaz’s house. One Sunday late in the offseason, Schafer went to church with Diaz. They talked about how to move forward from the suspension.

“Being able to talk with Matt, I don’t have any anger about it anymore,” Schafer said. “I’ve moved on. I’m totally content with the way things have been. Like he says, things happen for a reason. You have to be able to put your faith in God and let everything work itself out.”

Going on Diaz’s advice, Schafer wore collared shirts to the ballpark in spring training. He gave away his flashy red glove.

What do dressing nicely and having a normal glove have to do with going to church with a teammate?

When Schafer says that he wants to put his faith in God, does that mean he converted to Christianity recently or that he has re-newed his faith in God? Also, the article implies a generic Christianity, but a few details would give readers a much more complete idea of the religion ghosts present in this story. Maybe we’ll get more details later this season.

OK, let’s talk about this.

Let’s pull this comment from the Dallas Morning News religion-beat funeral post right out front. It comes from long-time reader Chris and deserves open debate.

Terry, your premise is either that professional reporters only work for MSM publications or that the only religion coverage worth reading comes from MSM publications. Either way, I reject your premise. Feel free to ban me.

We readers are a bit more discerning than you believe us to be. MSM publications are failing for a variety of reasons, but first and foremost it is because they have forgotten to put the customer first.

To which I responded.

… You are right that there are professionals in the “non-mainstream.” But they work FOR the institutions and for advocacy groups, with very few exceptions. They write tons of fine stuff and I read tons of it. Always have always will. So we both know that.

But the mainstream is still about 80 percent of the info that most of the world knows. You don’t want a world in which Stewart yelling at Limbaugh is normal news, or where the only info you have about, oh, the Anglican war comes from the Episcopal News Service and the online Anglican blogosphere. You need Eric Gorski, whether you know it or not.

Professional reporters have salaries and some degree of independence. Laugh at that. But it matters.

I accept much or even most of your attacks on the mainstream. That’s why this blog exists — to criticize the bad and praise the good.

You are, however, losing sight of the basic structural reality of media and info.

Let’s switch subjects. The Illinois legislature. Nice, clean bunch of folks, right?

You think life in Illinois will be better with only 15 full-time, local-beat mainstream reporters covering the legislature, not 150. That’s your argument. That’s what you are saying.

Right? And don’t tell me about the media habits of 5 percent of highly motivated readers, such as yourself. Tell me about PUBLIC DISCOURSE in this nation as a whole. Get real.

We have been through these waters before and, in the current crisis, this debate really matters.

As I said in a post — fitting called “RIP: The religion beat? — last summer:

It takes real money to pay people to report and edit real information. Most of what happens in weblogs — like this one, frankly — is secondary writing and criticism. We are all like those little fish stuck on the flanks of big sharks. Someone has to fund the shark, which does the real hunting.

You may not like the shark. The shark makes me mad, plenty of times. But we need the shark.

This is certainly a day of mourning for journalists who know anything about the history of religion-news coverage in the mainstream press.

While we await further specifics, here is the short report from Dallas that has just been posted online by Rod “Crunchy Cons” Dreher:

Religion in the media

Depressing very local news: there is no longer a religion beat at the Dallas Morning News. Our last two religion reporters have been reassigned to covering suburban schools. I have no idea why this decision was made, and I am in no position to question it, certainly.

All newspapers, and certainly my own, are in serious trouble during this economic crisis, and we can’t cover everything. But it is a shame, and indeed more than a shame, to think that the DMN’s Religion section used to be routinely acclaimed within the profession as the best religion section in the country. And given how passionately religious Dallas and its environs are, this is to be expected, and welcomed.

And now, we not only have no religion section, we have no religion beat reporters.

But religion has not ceased to be critically important to the lives of people today. I’d like to know from my readers what you think of the quality of religion coverage from your local media, and where you get your religion news. If your local paper was considering eliminating religion beat coverage, what case would you make to them to keep it?

By all means, please add your own commentaries in response to that question here and over at Dreher’s own weblog.

The late, many said great News religion section was highly symbolic for Godbeat professionals because it was launched during an era in the mid-1990s when several nationally known newsrooms — think NPR and ABC World News Tonight — were launching serious efforts to improve their religion coverage. Click here for a glimpse of that (especially if you are willing to pay to see the full article).

Here at GetReligion, we have chronicled the section’s decline into a web-based niche with a lively weblog — all fueled by solid professionals who were still working the beat, even though their analog home base was gone. While I, personally, have often been critical of some News coverage (the old section was kind of a National of Council of Churches publication trying to cover life in a National Association of Evangelicals town), I would be the first to note that this was serious religion coverage by talented professionals. The whole Dallas experiment offered hope to many mainstream journalists.

When the section was shut down, News editor Bob Mong sent this form letter to a concerned reader. I think it would be appropriate to cyber-clip this and send it back to the management team at the once mighty daily newspaper in one of America’s most important and symbolic cities (by all means, click here), when it comes to religion news.

Dear Ms. XXX,

Thank you for writing about the format change in our Religion coverage. I can assure you the subject is not going to be an afterthought. As the person responsible for creating the section in 1994, I am quite proud of its many accomplishments. We will continue to take it seriously, as well we should. With writers such as Jeff Weiss and Sam Hodges, we will continue to take on interesting, complex and important stories as we have the last 12-plus years. Those stories … may appear on Page One and other section fronts. For reasons I don’t entirely understand, we could never build even a modest advertising base for the stand-alone section. I can assure you, no paper in the country tried harder than we did to garner such support. I would encourage you to also look at our online Religion blog and newsletter; they are both quite good and growing in popularity.

I do understand your concern, and I hope you will come to see our coverage of the subject will continue to be significant.

With regards, Bob Mong, editor

Now the religion beat itself, the source of any dedicated religion coverage by full-time professionals, is gone. No religion reporter IN DALLAS?

Your GetReligionistas will pass along more information as it becomes available. I am sure that memorial service details will be announced soon.

UPDATE: I just heard some more details from Jeffrey Weiss in Dallas and they are not good. The religion-beat pros have been assigned out to suburban beats. The assumption is that if some story linked to religion came along — we are talking about Dallas, as in TEXAS — then they could still be assigned to it, if they have time.

Still waiting to hear about the status of the religion weblog.

Stay tuned.

As “old media” seek to reach new audiences through the use of online technologies, we’ve seen journalists, like the Boston Globe’s Michael Paulson develop blogs (his is “Articles of Faith”). Sometimes these are a way of posting less formal comments on a topic. Sometimes they offer another place to discuss issues that journalists can’t fit into the traditional news hole.

Which raises the question — to what standards should we hold these blogs? (And yes, I realize that these questions can also apply to us at GetReligion). At a minimum, one would expect journalists to strive for accuracy and make corrections if they make mistakes — those are also “old media” standards. But look beyond these fundamentals and the dilemmas get more interesting. Are reporters obligated, for example, to present more one point of view? Do they strive for objectivity — or is the blog a haven for personal opinions?

I pondered these questions while reading Manya Brachear’s post in her Chicago Tribune blog, “The Seeker” on a move by some clergy to back a Illinois bill decriminalizing the use of medical marijuana.

There’s actually a very serious national discussion going on about the use of marijuana to treat the symptoms of illnesses MS and chronic pain. But per my headline, pot is a topic that prompts some truly terrible humor — another reason to blame baby boomers, or maybe the Grateful Dead.

Brachear’s lede, frankly, thuds. As those using this particular Gospel story often seem to forget, Jesus didn’t only tell the aspiring “stoners” to cut it out, but told the adulterous woman to “go and sin no more.”

When Jesus proclaimed “He that is without sin among you, let him cast the first stone,” he was preaching compassion. Some Illinois clergy who support a different kind of getting stoned say they are urging compassion too.

More than 60 religious leaders in Illinois are calling on state senators this week to pass a bill that would allow patients to use medical marijuana with a doctor’s recommendation and without criminal consequences.

Brachear includes quotes from medical marijuana proponents, including clergy from the United Church of Christ and United Methodist denominations. But she doesn’t quote clergy opponents — who probably wouldn’t be that hard to find. Nor does she identify who is promoting this bill in the State Senate and whether they have any religious connection.

Several studies suggest that marijuana can mitigate nausea, pain and anxiety for patients with illnesses such as HIV, cancer, multiple sclerosis and chronic pain. Theological arguments are based on these findings.

“There is a moral obligation to heal and address suffering,” said Rev. Al Sharp, executive director of Chicago-based Protestants for the Common Good. “Jesus lived his life healing those where he could and bringing those to the absence of pain. This is entirely consistent with that.”

I would hope that those clergy who want to see marijuana legalized have a theological perspective on which to make that argument, rather than the other way around. The quote from Sharp supports that interpretation — and it would have been really helpful to have seen more of that kind of reflection — balanced by responses from opponents. At the end of her post, Brachear ask for reader response — but doesn’t give her readers nearly enough to work with. As a blogger, does she have to? What do you think?

Religious persecution tends to make for sensational stories. There’s a lot of human drama, and for better or worse, it’s easy to confirm the worst fears of certain segment of the population that is skeptical of the “organized religion” behemoth. It’s no wonder that journalists pounce on them when they find them.

When one can find a story of genuine religious persecution it tends to be a doozy, and a slam dunk for a crusading journalist. But stories where an entire religious institution is squarely and unjustly lined up against a single soul are pretty rare.

Take this Los Angeles Times story about Chad Hardy, a member of the Mormon church who recently got excommunicated for producing a beefcake calendar of those few former Mormon missionaries willing to strip off their short-sleeved white T-shirts and reveal a spray-on tan and a six-pack. Further, before Hardy could complete his final four credits toward a communications degree at Brigham Young University, a church-owned college, the school decided that Hardy had violated the school’s honor code and refused to grant him a degree. Reporter Ashley Powers lets Hardy tell his story and explain his motivations and explain his relationship to the Mormon church at some length:

“It was the perfect secret weapon,” he says as a makeup artist dusts the male models’ flab-free abs. “It’s friendly. It doesn’t tear down the beliefs of the church at all. Underneath, it makes people realize, ‘Oh, they’re sexy Mormons. They’re real.’

And this:

But “you’re constantly wrapped in guilt,” he says, recalling how, when he was a teenager, a church official asked whether he indulged in impure thoughts.

While studying at Ricks College (now BYU-Idaho) and BYU’s main campus in Provo, Utah, he felt out of place. “They were all trying to out-righteous each other. It’s who can follow the rules the best,” he says. He fell into a deep depression. “Those rules, I think, kept me from God.”

And this:

At the photo shoot, Hardy switches between directing models and doing telephone interviews. (“The church makes sex dirty,” he is saying, “and we’re making it beautiful.”) He wears a graphic-print T-shirt, a camouflage hoodie and sneakers with the slogan “Born to Be Free.” He is broad-shouldered, round-faced, blue-eyed and self-deprecating.

And this:

“Though we understand not everyone agrees with the project,” Hardy replied, “the individual expressions of those involved have reshaped perceptions, removed walls, and shown … acceptance and tolerance around the world.”

The rest of the piece is similarly dripping with sympathy. But as you might imagine, there are usually two sides to a story like this. Here’s pretty much the sum total of any opposing views from the church on what Hardy is doing:

BYU graduates must meet both academic and ecclesiastical standards, a university spokeswoman said, and in a letter to Hardy after the meeting, Dean Vernon Heperi said he had come up short.

“In my view,” the dean wrote, “the material related to your calendars is offensive and disrespectful.”

The returned missionaries are shown “in an inappropriate context” and the women in publicity shots for the “muffins” calendar are portrayed “contrary to the value of living a chaste and virtuous life.” (Heperi did not return messages seeking comment. A Mormon Church spokesman declined to discuss Hardy or the calendar.)

While I understand the church wasn’t exactly an open book with Powers, and that’s a difficult spot for any journalist to be in, surely she could have found some reasonable voices within the church representative of an opposing view. Especially since she has the audacity to quote anonymous internet posts from LDS members in an attempt to give a flavor of how Mormons are reacting to Hardy’s calendars:

One of the kinder Internet posts about Hardy calls him “an attention whore who … can contribute to bad LDS stereotypes and raise public disdain of church members.”

Then there’s Powers’ description of how Hardy was excommunicated:

Last summer, he faced a two-hour church disciplinary hearing in Las Vegas. Hardy was excommunicated by a panel of church leaders. Mormon officials suggested it was for reasons other than the calendar, though Hardy said that was what the panel questioned him about.

Why doesn’t she explain what other reasons the church suggested he was excommunicated for, instead of deferring to Hardy’s version of events?

But what’s truly bizarre about the article is how it’s positively obtuse in its bewilderment at how the awful, repressed church could possibly object to what Hardy’s doing. But the answer is right there in the story, not that Powers bothers to notice. Here’s the description of one calendar photoshoot from the lede:

A male model wearing a kilt of black vinyl strips, a red belt with a gold buckle and little else is flexing his muscles amid fake oil derricks and Roman columns in a photo studio. All chiseled pectorals and tanned thighs, he is playing Captain Moroni, a battlefield hero in the Book of Mormon who rallied troops with the Title of Liberty banner.

Chad Hardy, who is running the photo shoot, adjusts the model’s kilt. Captain Moroni lifts his chin, grips a sword and hoists the banner.

“Flex your abs,” Hardy reminds him.

And then there’s this description later in the story:

Hardy was emboldened. The 2009 calendar cover resembles a painting of the second coming of Christ. The shirtless model wears a rose-colored sash and white loincloth and is outlined in a celestial glow. Inside, Mr. September stands in front of a chalkboard with a diagram of the Mormon Plan of Salvation. Amid arrows and squiggles, the word “judgment” is clearly visible.

So we have sexualized portrayals of Moroni, who’s a sacred Mormon prophet, steamy photos that resemble “a painting of the second coming of Christ” and mocking Mormon doctrine as judgmental. Who could possibly object to that?

Hardy is free to make whatever claims he wants, but this piece does nothing toward explaining the full story. It also fails to provide any context of the portrayal of Mormons. The idea that sexualizing Mormon missionaries is a new or novel thing is absurd — the South Park guys had been there, done that 12 years ago and I guarantee that an unfiltered Google image search for “Mormon missionary” will send you down parts of the information superhighway where it’s a good idea not to roll down the window.

Michael A. Lindenberger of Time and Dr. Albert Mohler of The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary have established an interesting call-and-response on gay marriage. Lindenberger’s latest report, drawing on a reprinted Mohler commentary from last Thursday, suggests a future in which conservative churches are at odds not only with the state but also with more liberal churches.

Lindenberger’s report links to another story, from March 16, that discusses what may well become the heart of the conflict: What involvement should the state have in the debate about marriage? Lindenberger refers to a brief essay by Douglas W. Kmiec and Shelley Ross Saxer that urges the California Supreme Court to leave the definition of marriage to religious institutions. At the same time, some clergy want to recuse themselves from functioning as agents of the state during marriage ceremonies. These clergy want the state to enact civil marriages and churches to provide subsequent blessings of those marriages.

Let’s linger on the point for a moment: For some law professors and clergy, the question of which institution establishes marriages already has become a hot potato. By comparison, it’s highly unlikely that most proponents or opponents of gay marriage will surrender on how marriage is defined, or on which institution does the defining.

I think a fascinating straw poll would involve asking couples, “At what moment were you married to one another?” For those couples who were married in a house of worship, how many would trace the transformative moment to picking up their marriage license from the clerk of court?

Lindenberger makes a fundamental error when he writes this about Mohler and Archbishop Joseph E. Kurtz of Louisville: “So while both men are calling for courage and compassion among their flocks, it’s not clear yet whether their message that homosexuals are sinners by definition is resonating beyond their staunchest supporters.”

Neither Mohler nor Kurtz teaches that ‘homosexuals are sinners by definition.” For conservatives, the debate is about sexual behavior rather than inclination.

Otherwise, Lindenberger does a fine job of describing a conflict that has dragged on for decades — at least in liberal Protestant denominations — but, from the perspective of the broader culture, is only beginning.

Rather than update my previous Armenian genocide post with a link to Julia Duin’s article on its anniversary in the Washington Times, I wanted to highlight it separately. I noted that most stories about the events of 1915 were solely or almost exclusively political. Very few touched on religion in any meaningful way.

However, the Times used the anniversary as a hook to explore how one theological concept — corporate repentance — differs across various religions. What would contrition look like, Duin asks, from a secular state based on a religious tradition that does not practice corporate repentance?:

The concept of national repentance started with Jewish prophets in the Hebrew Scriptures. Christians then ran with the idea, with modern examples including President Lincoln’s 1863 call to a day of national repentance and fasting. His idea lives on in the National Day of Prayer on the first Thursday of each May.

Plus, Christians ranging from the late Pope John Paul II to bands of evangelical Protestant missionaries have apologized for the excesses of the Crusades. But what Islamic entity has apologized for the 300 years of conquest that provoked the Crusades?

These are the kinds of questions I wish newspapers gave more room to explore. (Side note: I’m always somewhat amazed at the widespread ignorance — both in the media and in the general population — about the periods before, during and after the Crusades. There’s so much to the larger story that is completely ignored. I’m ashamed to admit I didn’t even know the Crusades were in response to anything until a few years ago. It was just never mentioned in my history textbooks or in any media reports. I knew almost nothing about the history of Muslim expansion until I explored the issue on my own after 9/11.) And bringing it forward, it would be so interesting to hear from people about how different views of corporate sin, repentance and absolution (or even individual sin, etc.) impact public policy.

Duin quotes Wadi Haddad, a retired professor of Islamic studies and Christian-Muslim relations at Hartford Seminary in Connecticut, saying that such corporate repentance is very Western. Other scholars weigh in:

“Individual Muslims can express regret or repentance, but I don’t know what the appropriate institution would be to express Islamic regret,” Georgetown University Islamic history professor John Voll told me. Christianity has corporate bodies representing its various divisions, he added, but “in Islam, there is no corporate structure that represents the umma [world Muslim community].”

While many reporters are out there repeating the Armenian desire for acknowledgment of and apology for the genocide, what a great idea to explore how such requests are viewed from the Muslim perspective.

There are times when I really feel the pain of the brilliant folks who work with the polling and research division of the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life.

After all, how would you like to try to put the astonishingly complex world of American religion into those short, punchy phrases that pollsters have to use? You have to use words that mean something to people on sidewalks and in living rooms, yet the phrases also have to have some connection to the actual doctrines and historical facts that are used by insiders and scholars.

Then, to make matters worse, all of this is going to be reporting in mainstream public media in short, short and shorter reports, at times by reporters who have no clue what they are doing.

You can see the problems, even when Pew Forum research ends up in the hands of veteran, skilled reporters who definitely know what they are doing. Here is Jacqueline L. Salmon of the Washington Post, describing the new Pew Forum report that attempts to shed light on the reasons that Americans give for switching from one religion to another.

More Americans have given up their faith or changed religions because of a gradual spiritual drift than switched because of a disillusionment over their churches’ policies, according to a new study released today which illustrates how personal spiritual attitudes are taking precedence over denominational traditions.

The survey by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life is the first large-scale study of the reasons behind Americans switching their religious faith and found that more than half of people have done so at least once during their lifetime. Almost three-quarters of Catholics and Protestants who are now unaffiliated with a religion said they had “just gradually drifted away” from their faith. And more than three-quarters of Catholics and half of Protestants currently not associated with a faith said that, over time, they stopped believing in their religion’s teachings.

The problem, of course, is that it is almost impossible to precisely define what it means to “change religions.” Is there, for example, a difference between “changing” and “converting”?

Clearly, if people convert from Christianity to Judaism, they have changed religions. But most of the numbers, in this poll, reflect changes inside Christianity, including the hip change from membership in a specific church to the freelance “spiritual, not religious,” but still “Christian sort-of” status. The pollsters knew this and included a crucial line in their survey: “Raised Protestant, now different Protestant faith.”

So if you are Southern Baptist and become an Episcopalian, that is a change.

However, truth be told, I have known people whose faith changed more — in terms of doctrinal content — when they went from membership in a Southern Baptist church to being part of a “moderate” Southern Baptist church, than if that those same people had gone from membership in Southern Baptist congregations to membership in a low-church, evangelical Anglican parishes.

How about Southern Baptist to American Baptist? Episcopalian to Charismatic Episcopalian? A cultural Greek Orthodox parish to a convert-friendly Greek Orthodox parish? Evangelical Lutheran and Missouri-Synod Lutheran? Reform Jew to Orthodox Jew? Etc., etc.

Like I said, I feel the Pew folks’ pain. The online talking points about this study hint at another problem that is out there:

Catholicism has suffered the greatest net loss in the process of religious change. Many people who leave the Catholic Church do so for religious reasons; two-thirds of former Catholics who have become unaffiliated say they left the Catholic faith because they stopped believing in its teachings, as do half of former Catholics who are now Protestant. Fewer than three-in-ten former Catholics, however, say the clergy sexual abuse scandal factored into their decision to leave Catholicism.

In contrast with other groups, those who switch from one Protestant denominational family to another (e.g., were raised Baptist and are now Methodist) tend to be more likely to do so in response to changed circumstances in their lives. Nearly four-in-ten people who have changed religious affiliation within Protestantism say they left their childhood faith, in part, because they relocated to a new community, and nearly as many say they left their former faith because they married someone from a different religious background.

How much of this, in other words, is simply generic church shopping? The marriage factor is also huge for people whose faith is not that central to their lives. It’s easy for people to switch when the switch doesn’t mean that much to them.

Over at USA Today, Godbeat veteran Cathy Lynn Grossman’s report also included a sobering summary for Catholic leaders. It appears that the mainline Protestant-ization of American Catholicism continues at a rapid pace. Perhaps generic, everyday Catholicism isn’t all that radically different these days?

Catholicism has suffered the greatest net loss in the process of religious change: The 10% of U.S. adults who have quit the church vastly outnumber the 2.6% who are incoming Catholics. Two in three who became unaffiliated — and half of those who became Protestant — say they left the Catholic Church because they “stopped believing its teachings.” The sexual abuse scandal was a factor for fewer than three in 10 former Catholics.

In conclusion, let me note one other issue that may be hidden down in this Pew Forum research (and I intend to ask about it).

Anyone who works in the wider world of modern religion knows about the so-called 80-20 rule. This states that about 80 percent of the work, worship and giving is done by about 20 percent of the membership, the most dedicated members who have the strongest ties to their particular faith and to the content of its doctrine.

What happens when these people convert from one faith to another? What are the doctrinal fuses that must be lit to drive a devout believer — say a clergyperson — from Canterbury to Rome, from Nashville to Geneva, from Jerusalem to Athens? I know, from experience (my Orthodox parish is about 90 percent converts), that this is a radically matter than making a church switch due to marriage or a change in zip code.

Alas, how do you put that kind of human blood, sweat and tears into a poll questionnaire?

There was something about the story in Monday’s New York Daily News that just didn’t have the ring of truth. The headline was “New Riverside Church Pastor Says His Raise Was Lord-Approved” and it began like this:

The incoming pastor of Riverside Church broke his silence over his massive pay package Saturday, saying God was behind him as he took the reins of the iconic Manhattan sanctuary.

“God told me all week, ‘I got you.’” the Rev. Brad Braxton said to thunderous applause.

Braxton was installed as senior pastor despite some parishioners filing a lawsuit to trim his $600,000 in salary and perks.

Could it be, I wondered, that the new minister, a 40-year-old theology professor from Vanderbilt Divinity, would discuss his salary from the pulpit on the Sunday of his installation? And would he say something so seemingly arrogant? God approved my salary?

Riverside Church, built by John D. Rockefeller at the height of the Depression, is one of the city’s most prominent churches. The story of the new minister’s compensation package — and an attempt by a group of unhappy parishioners to stop his installation — has been in the local papers for days. The Riverside Church media office did not answer my request for a text of Braxton’s sermon so I went to the church website and listened to the service on line.

As it turns out, there was a mention of the new minister’s salary, but not by Braxton. Billy Jones, chairman of the Church Committee, announced that the installations was proceeding because the efforts to stop it were defeated in court. Without going into details, he said that the dissident members had exaggerated the compensation package and that it was, in fact, in line with what the leaders of other major Manhattan churches earn. The actual salary, he said, was $250,000.

The line quoted in the Daily News — “I got you” — was indeed uttered by Braxton but not in the context of his salary but in the development of his sermon which he titled “Fear Not.” Braxton spoke about the fears people have going into new situations and used his own transition as an example. This, he said, was a time that tested both the faith of the church and the minister. “Riverside Church,” he said, “Fear not. God told me all week, ‘I got you.’ God’s presence is our present. It’s a gracious gift to know that God’s got us.”

That’s not “breaking the silence” on his salary but good old fashioned Baptist preaching. Braxton went on to layout his agenda for his ministry. A few days earlier, I read in The New York Times that in addition to the salary issue some in the church had other problems with Braxton:

They also complained that Dr. Braxton was moving Riverside away from its tradition of interracial progressivism and toward a conservative style of religious practice.

Conservative religious practice? The Times didn’t explain what that meant. Was he a social conservative? Far from it, I learned as I listened to the rest of the sermon. Braxton said that once a person overcame fear, he or she could “move mountains.” He spoke of moving the mountains of racism, economic despair, injustice against immigrants and “sexual bigotry.” He announced his support for gay marriage, which is now heading for a vote in New York state legislature. Braxton attacked what he called “Christian imperialism” and challenged President Barack Obama to withdraw immediately not only from Iraq but from Afghansitan. Certainly not your run-of-the-mill religious conservative.

Braxton got his loudest applause when he attacked the Daily News. “I promised the Lord I would only meddle one time today,” he said and added after a meaningful pause: “And I hope this one gets on the front page of the Daily News.” At the mention of the name of the newspaper, a loud boo went up from the crowd. He continued:

It’s time for us to move the mountain of HIV-AIDS by encouraging the use of condoms in African countries and other global communities. I wonder if that will make the front page of the Daily News.

There was one more mountain he wanted to move. He asked God to “move the mountain of distrust and animosity in this congregation by speaking the truth in love.”

In short, I got a very different impression of the new minister of Riverside when I listened to his sermon. The New York newspapers, so focused on the dollars, simply didn’t do him or his theology justice.