Massachusetts

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New England city votes for polyamory: Does religion have anything to do with this news story?

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So what does “conservative” mean in American these days, when journalists are talking about cultural debates in the public square? How about the term “culture wars”?

While there are moral libertarians out there, I would assume that they are rarely called “conservatives.” There are people — think Andrew Sullivan — who are liberal on most social issues (not all), but journalists tend to identify them as conservatives because they defend basic First Amendment rights for all, even “conservatives.”

Too see what that looks like in practice, check out this new Sullivan commentary at NPR:

I believe in life. I believe in treasuring it as a mystery that will never be fully understood, as a sanctity that should never be destroyed, as an invitation to experience now what can only be remembered tomorrow. I believe in its indivisibility, in the intimate connection between the newest bud of spring and the flicker in the eye of a patient near death, between the athlete in his prime and the quadriplegic vet, between the fetus in the womb and the mother who bears another life in her own body.

I believe in liberty. I believe that within every soul lies the capacity to reach for its own good, that within every physical body there endures an unalienable right to be free from coercion.

That sound you hear, on left and right, is people saying: “But what about … ?”

This brings me to a haunted (click here for context) news story that ran the other day in The New York Times with this epic double-decker headline:

A Massachusetts City Decides to Recognize Polyamorous Relationships

The city of Somerville has broadened the definition of domestic partnership to include relationships between three or more adults, expanding access to health care.

This raises all kinds of questions, including this one: “How did these public officials define ‘relationships’?” The lede simply notes that this “left-leaning Massachusetts city expanded its notion of family to include people who are polyamorous, or maintaining consenting relationships with multiple partners.”


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Plug-In: Faith vs. COVID-19 -- Restrictions prompt clashes over churches reopening

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Culture wars, meet the coronavirus.

In the nation’s latest religious freedom battle, church leaders in numerous states — from New York to Oregon — are clashing with governors over how and when to resume in-person gatherings.

President Donald Trump entered the fray today, saying he has deemed houses of worship “essential.” He called on states to allow the reopening of churches, synagogues and mosques despite lingering concerns over the spread of COVID-19, according to The Associated Press.

Just one example of the debates happening nationally: The Boston Globe reported on Thursday’s front page that Gov. Charlie Baker allowed Massachusetts worship gatherings to resume because he knew courts might force his hand.

In California, more than 1,200 pastors have vowed to hold in-person services May 31, defying Gov. Gavin Newsom, according to the Los Angeles Times. The U.S. Justice Department has warned the state that its coronavirus rules might violate religious freedoms.

In Minnesota, Catholic and Lutheran churches have informed Gov. Tim Walz of their plans to begin meeting again despite his executive order limiting religious services to 10 people, the Star-Tribune reported. Church groups are divided on the governor’s order, according to the newspaper’s religion writer, Jean Hopfensperger.

“It’s hard to see how under any reading of the First Amendment the Mall of America can be allowed to reopen while churches must keep their doors closed to all but a handful,” the Wall Street Journal said in an editorial.

In related news:

* Federal guidance for reopening houses of worship was put on hold after a battle between the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the White House, the Washington Post reported. (Update: President Donald Trump said Thursday that his administration would release guidelines for reopening places of worship by today, according to NBC News.)


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First in a series? Ambitious AP feature examines waves of stress hitting Catholic priests

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When covering complex, controversial subjects, the journalism educators at the Poynter Institute have long stressed the importance of paying attention to criticisms made by “stakeholders” linked to a story.

What’s a “stakeholder”? Basically, it is a person or group directly linked to the core issues and information included in a news story, people whose lives and work will be directly affected by this coverage.

That’s the first thing I thought about when I saw the ambitious Associated Press feature that ran with this headline: “US Catholic priests describe turmoil amid sex abuse crisis.” It’s an important article addressing a topic — waves of change sweeping over a declining number of priests — that would be hard to cover in a book-length report, let alone a newspaper feature.

What do the ultimate “stakeholders” — Catholic priests — think of this story?

As you would expect, the story had to find a way to focus — focusing special attention on the work of one priest who symbolizes larger trends. Thus, readers are introduced to the Rev. Mark Stelzer, a 62-year-old professor and chaplain at a Catholic college in Western Massachusetts who is also a recovering alcoholic who helps others wrestling with that demon. Now, he has been asked to serve as administrator at a nearby parish with 500 families. This brings us to the heart of this report:

Weighing on the entire Catholic clergy in the U.S. is the ripple effect of their church’s long-running crisis arising from sex abuse committed by priests. It’s caused many honorable priests to sense an erosion of public support and to question the leadership of some of their bishops. That dismay is often compounded by increased workloads due to the priest shortage, and increased isolation as multi-priest parishes grow scarce. They see trauma firsthand. Some priests minister in parishes wracked by gun violence; others preside frequently over funerals of drug-overdose victims.


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Why God continues to have a place at Thanksgiving tables and in Thanksgiving stories

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As millions of Americans sit down today to a turkey dinner with all their favorite side dishes, many will pause to say a prayer or otherwise give thanks.

That’s part of the story, after all. The one central theme to the holiday that endures to this day is the idea of giving God thanks. It’s the reason why the Pilgrims held a feast in the first place a year after making landfall in what is now Plymouth, Mass.

Even as a growing number of young people identify with no religion, Americans are still largely thankful to God. While the day is marked with football games and parades, it’s also true that Thanksgiving, one of the least commercial holiday’s celebrated in America, has a religious origin that has been debated ever since the Pilgrims marked the original Thanksgiving dinner in 1621 following their first harvest.

Two years away from the 400th anniversary of the holiday and days away from another Thanksgiving, historians and scholars continue to debate what the feast continues to mean for Americans. The holiday, while rooted in religious tradition, remains one of the things that ties modern secular society to this country’s colonial past. More than a Protestant holiday despite its roots, the day is celebrated by all denominations and viewed as uniquely American.

The day we now call Thanksgiving was observed by the Pilgrims and the Wampanoag Indians in October 1621. The feast lasted three days and, according to attendee Edward Winslow, was attended by 90 Native Americans and 53 Pilgrims.

The Pilgrims, like the colonists that followed them, celebrated a thanksgiving several times a year when the harvest was plentiful. It was highlighted by attending church services and thanking God before a large meal. Throughout the American Revolution, a day was set aside for giving thanks. Connecticut, for example, was the first to do so. The biggest change by the 17th century was that politicians were the ones calling for a Thanksgiving rather than church authorities.


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Ghosts of Elizabeth Warren: Potential White House contender seeks to 'reclaim' Oklahoma past

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Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren traveled to her native state of Oklahoma recently to speak at a teachers’ rally at her old high school, Northwest Classen in Oklahoma City.

The Los Angeles Times used the occasion as a perfectly reasonable peg for an in-depth profile of the potential 2020 Democratic candidate for president.

The original headline on the Times story, published today, was this:

Elizabeth Warren is trying to reclaim her past as she prepares for the ‘fight’ in 2020

As I type this, there’s a tweaked headline atop the story (“Elizabeth Warren goes back home to Oklahoma, as she forward to 2020”), but I actually think the original title better encapsulates the profile’s general thrust. (Quick note on the new headline: Hopefully, someone will notice the missing “looks” before “forward.”)

In reading the Times piece, I was extremely curious to see if religion would figure in the descriptions of Warren’s Sooner background and her effort to appeal to a Bible Belt state known for its conservative values and voting patterns.

After all, the Boston Globe noted in a 2012 profile that during Warren’s early years in a community south of Oklahoma City, “Life in Norman revolved around church and the military, in that order.”

Later, the family moved to Oklahoma City, as the Globe recounted:

And the culture was then, as now, deeply religious and deeply conservative. Warren’s family attended a Methodist church, where her mother taught Sunday school.


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What four-letter words are now OK? What politically-correct doctrines are mandatory?

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What four-letter words are now OK? What politically-correct doctrines are mandatory?

It doesn’t rank with July 4, Dec. 7 or 9-11, but Oct. 8, 2016, is a journalistic date to remember, if one cares about the tone and content of journalism and, thus, American public discourse.

There it was in an A1 lead in The New York Times.

The F-bomb.

No “expletive deleted,” no euphemism, no cautious dashes. In this article a newspaper so dignified it uses honorifics in second references (“Mr. Hitler”) included the B-word, P-word, and T-word in the first four paragraphs above the fold.

What hath Citizen Donald Trump wrought? 

Dirty words can still hit broadcasters with federal government wrath. Yet Boston-NYC-DC and Left Coast editors (not so much in Flyover Country) are certainly influenced by the cultural coarsening from showbiz. Now there’s academic imprimatur from cognitive science professor Benjamin Bergen, whose new book “What the F” contends that uttering four-letter words is good for your mental health.

Journalists are still coming to terms with the grammatically incorrect but politically correct pronoun shift as they/them/their supplant the dreaded he/she/her/his. One Times contributor has employed the xe/xim/xir pronoun plan devised by the transgender movement, and another informs us that in this “age of gender fluidity” the recently coined “cisgender” is now the “preferred term” for those whose sex is defined the old-fashioned way, by anatomy, not psychological “sense of gender.”

“Cisgender,” New York Post columnist Maureen Callahan alerts us, is among the neologisms added this year by dictionary.com, alongside “misgender” (mistaking someone’s preferred gender identity) and “panromantic” (“romantically attracted to people of all sexual orientations and gender identities”). Also new to the lexicon is “woke,” to label someone who’s not merely awakened to his/her/their “white privilege” but super-vigilant about “systemic injustices and prejudices.”

Ignoring the new pronouns can get you in trouble, perhaps even in pews and pulpits.


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Re: transgender restrooms, a lawsuit over where churches' religious freedom begins, ends

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If a church hosts a spaghetti supper and invites the public to attend, does that church give up its religious freedom?

Let's say, for example, the church believes people should use a restroom corresponding to their God-assigned gender at birth. If that church invites non-members to eat pasta in its building, must the church allow transgender individuals to use whichever restroom they prefer?

Such questions are not just theoretical. They are at the heart of a lawsuit filed Tuesday by a handful of Massachusetts churches.

Readers must wade through a bunch of political talk, but the Boston Globe hits the high points in its coverage:

Four Massachusetts churches contend in a federal lawsuit that a new state law could force them to allow transgender people to use the church bathrooms, changing rooms, and shower facilities of their choice, violating the plaintiffs’ constitutional right to freely practice their religion.
The litigation opens a new front in a broader effort to undermine the law, which bars discrimination against transgender people in restaurants, malls, and other public accommodations.
Also Tuesday, the secretary of state confirmed that opponents had gathered enough signatures to place a repeal of the law on the ballot in 2018.
“This is bigger than bathrooms,” said Andrew Beckwith, president of the conservative Massachusetts Family Institute and a central player in the lawsuit and the repeal effort. “This law is eliminating rights that have existed for as long as this country has been in existence — fundamental rights to privacy, to modesty and safety, now constitutional rights to religious freedom.”

So where does the spaghetti supper question fit in?


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That big U.S. Supreme Court case isn't only 2015 gay dispute for religion-beat reporters to watch

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That big U.S. Supreme Court case isn't only 2015 gay dispute for religion-beat reporters to watch

Alongside that big U.S. Supreme Court case on gay marriage, another 2015 showdown merits journalistic attention.

It involves Gordon College, an evangelical campus located in the onetime heartland of the Massachusetts Puritans. Meeting Feb. 5-6, and again in May, Gordon’s trustees will ponder whether to scrap a rule  that “sexual relations outside marriage, and homosexual practice will not be tolerated” among students and staff, whether on or off campus.

The New England Association of Schools and Colleges has directed the college to explain its policy for a meeting in September. The association has the power to remove  accreditation if Gordon violated the requirement of “non-discriminatory policies and practices in recruitment, admissions, employment, evaluation, disciplinary action, and advancement.”

Background: Gordon’s president, D. Michael Lindsay, is no backwoods rube but a Princeton Ph.D. who was an award-winning sociology professor at Rice University. Gordon’s sexual stance drew attention because Lindsay gave a helping hand to groups like Catholic Charities, the National Association of Evangelicals’ World Relief and Bethany Christian Services, the largest U.S. adoption agency.

Last July he joined Catholic and Protestant leaders in writing a letter to President Barack Obama seeking exemption for such religious employers in a pending executive order to forbid federal contractors from discrimination against  lesbians, gays, bisexuals and the transgendered.  The religious petitioners lost that fight.


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The New York Times revisits high court's abortion buffer zone ruling

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In grading first-day coverage of the U.S. Supreme Court striking down a Massachusetts abortion buffer zone law, I gave The New York Times a D.

My explanation for the near-failing grade:

The NYTimes’front-page story does an excellent job of explaining where the justices came down. But the Old Gray Lady shows her bias when it comes to reporting reactions to the decision, giving top billing — and much more space — to Planned Parenthood than the winning plaintiff.

The newspaper improved its performance — let's give it an A for enterprise and a B for overall content — with a second-day story out of Boston exploring what the Supreme Court decision means for both sides.

The NYTimesgives readers a firsthand view of a clinic where the yellow line no longer matters:

BOSTON — Lorraine Loewen, 74, says she comes here once a week to demonstrate against abortion outside of the Planned Parenthood League of Massachusetts health care center.

On Friday, the morning after the Supreme Court struck down restrictions that had created no-protest buffer zones near abortion clinics, she stood inside the yellow line on the pavement that marked a 35-foot radius around the clinic’s entrance.

Ms. Loewen, a retiree from Dedham, Mass., approached a woman and a man who had climbed out of a taxi and were walking toward the clinic, which provides an array of sexual health services, including abortions, and spoke softly in the woman’s ear. She handed the woman a pamphlet depicting a woman’s face and the words, “It’s your choice.”

“I asked her if we could be of any help,” Ms. Loewen said, adding that she preferred talking close up with the people going to the clinic rather than yelling at them from outside the line.

On Friday, Ms. Loewen and a handful of other demonstrators were among the first anti-abortion activists, as a few police officers looked on and a volunteer escort stood ready to bring patients inside the clinic.

From there, the story offers brief background on the high court ruling and then turns to a long section outlining concerns of state officials and abortion-rights advocates who favored the buffer zone law.

The NYTimes allows one couple to complain anonymously about the protesters:


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