Bobby Ross Jr.

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They're praying, singing after Alton Sterling shooting. But what are they praying, singing?

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I haven't watched the graphic video of Alton Sterling's shooting this week by police in Louisiana.

Truthfully, I don't want to see it (or the one of last night's shooting of Philando Castile by police in Minnesota).

The sobbing images of Sterling's 15-year-old son, Cameron, are painful enough to witness.

At its heart, the news out of Baton Rouge, La., is about law and justice — and state and federal authorities have pledged a full investigation to determine the facts, as reported on the front page of today's New York Times.

But there are hints, too, of holy ghosts in the coverage of this story. More on that in a moment.

First, though, let's check out the Times' lede:

BATON ROUGE, La. — The Justice Department opened a civil rights investigation on Wednesday into the fatal shooting of a black man by the Baton Rouge, La., police after a searing video of the encounter, aired repeatedly on television and social media, reignited contentious issues surrounding police killings of African-Americans.
Officials from Gov. John Bel Edwards to the local police and elected officials vowed a complete and transparent investigation and appealed to the city — after a numbing series of high-profile, racially charged incidents elsewhere — to remain calm.


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No religion angle as ChristianMingle.com opens website to gay singles? Really?!?!

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Maybe you caught the news that gay singles will be able to mingle online — at ChristianMingle.com, that is.

The Wall Street Journal reports:

The owner of online dating site ChristianMingle.com has agreed to let gay and lesbian users search for same-sex matches under a judge-approved settlement of discrimination claims.
Two gay men filed class-actions claims against Spark Networks Inc.in California courts in 2013 alleging that ChristianMingle.com and several other sites in the company’s portfolio of niche dating services excluded users looking to meet singles of the same sex.
ChristianMingle, billed as the largest online community for Christian singles, required new users to specify whether they’re a man seeking a woman or a woman seeking a man. The lead plaintiffs, two gay men who tried using it, claimed that the limited options violated California’s anti-discrimination law.
Known as the Unruh Civil Rights Act, the state law requires “business establishments” to offer “full and equal accommodations” to people regardless of their sexual orientation.

Keep reading, and the WSJ provides details on the terms approved by a state judge and notes that Spark Networks agreed to pay each plaintiff $9,000, plus $450,000 in attorneys' fees. The newspaper quotes one of the plaintiffs' attorneys, who is "gratified" by the settlement. Spark Networks, meanwhile, is "pleased to resolve this litigation."

End of story.

Wait, what!?


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On the day after Fourth of July, four Godbeat developments you'll want to know about

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Welp. It was quite a Fourth of July here in Oklahoma City.

Perhaps you heard the news about Thunder superstar Kevin Durant's Independence Day.

Yes, there's a religion angle. But we'll save that for a post later this week from our own tmatt, GetReligion's resident expert on faith and the NBA.

As I join my fellow Oklahomans in mourning Durant's departure, the day after the Fourth of July (that would make it July 5, right?) seems like an opportune time to update readers on four key developments on the Godbeat:

1. The Religion Newswriters Association is no more.

No, the professional organization for Godbeat pros has not disbanded. It's thriving, in fact. But it has a new name: Religion News Association.

Here's how a news release from RNA (yes, that acronym is still correct) explains the change:


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After a home run, a baseball player looks to the sky — might something religious be occurring?

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For most of my life, I've loved baseball and newspapers.

I trace the roots of both those passions to the mid-1970s, when I was about 10 or 11 years old. At that time, my dad preached for a small Church of Christ in Elkin, N.C., a small town about 45 miles west of Winston-Salem.

The Cincinnati Reds — the Big Red Machine — were my team, and pre-gambling-scandal Pete Rose was my favorite player. One time, I wrote Rose a fan letter; I was overjoyed when I received an autographed picture from him in the mail. (That was several years before my family moved to the Lone Star State, where I the Texas Rangers became my team.)

In those days, a boy wanting to keep up with his favorite team couldn't buy an MLB.com package or Google for the score online. A few major-league games a week were televised — Saturday afternoon on NBC and Monday night on ABC, if I recall correctly — but the Reds were featured only a handful of times a year. 

So anytime I got my allowance, I'd buy a few packs of baseball cards and the latest edition of the Winston-Salem Journal. I'd memorize the previous season's stats from the back of the baseball cards and check the Journal's sports section to see how the Reds were doing in the standings. Often, the score from the previous night's game wouldn't make the next day's paper. It would be marked "late game," much to the chagrin of a boy who had just spent a precious quarter (I think that's what the daily edition cost back then) on the paper.

After looking for the baseball scores first, I'd go ahead and read the entire Journal — and thus began my lifelong love of headlines and news on the printed page.

Why do I mention all of the above? Credit (or blame) my friend Lisa Brewer, who lives in Wilkesboro, N.C. 


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Concerning the dozens dead in Istanbul: Why religious affiliation of victims matters

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Dozens dead at the Istanbul airport.

Hundreds injured.

Are we even surprised anymore when images of yet another terror attack linked (it seems) to the Islamic State bombard our screens?

There is, as almost always seems to be the case, a huge religion angle on this latest attack (and not the one you might think). But first, the latest lede from The Associated Press:

ISTANBUL (AP) -- Suicide attackers armed with guns and bombs killed 41 people and wounded hundreds at Istanbul's busy Ataturk Airport, apparently targeting Turkey's crucial tourism industry. The government blamed the attack on Islamic State extremists but there was no immediate confirmation from the group.
Scenes of chaos and panic unfolded Tuesday night as gunfire and explosions on two different floors sent crowds fleeing first in one direction, then another.
Airport surveillance video posted on social media appeared to show one explosion, a ball of fire that sent terrified passengers racing for safety. Another appeared to show an attacker, felled by a gunshot from a security officer, blowing himself up seconds later. A growing stream of travelers, some rolling suitcases behind them, fled down a corridor, looking fearfully over their shoulders.
"Four people fell in front of me. They were torn into pieces," said airport worker Hacer Peksen.
The victims included at least 13 foreigners and several people remained unidentified Wednesday. The toll excluded the three bombers. The Istanbul governor's office said more than 230 people were wounded.

As GetReligion readers know, historic details really matter in Instanbul.


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Compassion vs. conversion: surprising insight on why these evangelicals welcome refugees

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I traveled to the Toronto area earlier this year to write about two Canadian churches that partnered to adopt a family of Syrian refugees:

BEAMSVILLE, Ontario — As war ravaged their homeland, a Syrian family of eight fled for their lives.
The Muslim father, mother and six children — among 4 million Syrians who have escaped to neighboring countries — ended up in a refugee camp in Lebanon.

There, they lived in a barn for four years.
Conditions became so dire that the family — including a daughter with cerebral palsy — contemplated returning home, despite the 5-year-old civil war that has claimed an estimated 470,000 lives.

“Inhumane” is the single word that an Arabic interpreter used to translate the Syrians’ lengthy description of the camp.

Enter two Churches of Christ south of Toronto — their hearts touched by the plight of strangers abroad and resolved to show the love of Jesus to a suffering family.

In reporting that story for The Christian Chronicle, I was interested in the "delicate balance between serving and evangelizing," as national reporter Adelle Banks characterizes the dichotomy in a new feature for Religion News Service (more on her excellent piece in just a moment).

My story quoted church member Marcia Cramp and Noel Walker on that topic:

The church members hope to introduce the family to the Gospel of Jesus.

For now, they’re content to build the relationship slowly and learn more about the Syrians’ own faith.


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The key to understanding the Supreme Court decision on Texas abortion restrictions

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Big news today out of the U.S. Supreme Court: As the Washington Post reports, the court — in a 5-3 decision — struck down Texas abortion restrictions that had caused more than half the state's abortion clinics to close.

As always, abortion is one of those topics that mix politics and religion, no matter how hard people try to keep the topics separate. 

The New York Times notes:

The decision concerned two parts of a Texas law that imposes strict requirements on abortion providers. It was passed by the Republican-dominated Texas Legislature and signed into law in July 2013 by Rick Perry, the governor at the time.
One part of the law requires all clinics in the state to meet the standards for ambulatory surgical centers, including regulations concerning buildings, equipment and staffing. The other requires doctors performing abortions to have admitting privileges at a nearby hospital.

How important is this decision? The Daily Beast is pretty excited, calling it "the biggest victory for abortion rights since Roe V. Wade."

Meanwhile, Rod "Friend of this Blog" Dreher of the American Conservative is less enthused (see his new post "Abortion Forever"), but he, too, attaches great significance to the ruling:

The bottom line, it seems to me, is that the Supreme Court will never let any state restriction stand meaningfully in the way of the Sexual Revolution. Ever. No federalism, no democracy, not when it comes to defending the Sexual Revolution.

So what should news consumers look for in the media coverage of this decision?

 


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Major oops! NPR discovers that the Rev. Billy Graham is, in fact, NOT dead

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This breaking news just in: The Rev. Billy Graham is, in fact, NOT dead.

For at least a brief time this week, NPR reported otherwise in its coverage of Donald Trump's closed-door meeting with (certain) evangelical leaders.

This is the correction appended to the bottom of the story:

Correction
June 21, 2016
An earlier version of this story incorrectly referred to "the late evangelist Rev. Billy Graham." Graham, 97, has not died.

"Oops!" I said in reply to the GetReligion reader who shared the NPR link.

"That's a major oops!" the reader replied.


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Yes, we'll keep defending journalism essentials, even when faced with 'so-called' impartiality

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Apparently, the Los Angeles Times got Julia Duin's memo. Finally.

My fellow GetReligionista questioned last week why the news media seemed "to be ignoring a bill going through the California state legislature that would have a huge impact on dozens of religious colleges in the state and, eventually, the nation as a whole."

Julia wrote:

The matter has enormous implications for the rest of the country because, as we all know, what goes on in California doesn't stay in California.
If religious colleges lose their heads here – financially and doctrinally speaking – they can lose elsewhere too. So where the MSM in this debate? Are they simply unaware of how important religious higher education is in this state or don't they care?

Nearly a week later, the Times has the story.

Here's the opening paragraph:

Dozens of faith-based colleges in California are objecting to legislation that they say would infringe on religious freedom by allowing lawsuits from gay and transgender students who feel discriminated against because their sexual orientation conflicts with church tenets.


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