Get Religion is a national and global journalism site focusing on how the mainstream press covers religion news in politics, entertainment, business and sports.
I feel a bit like a sandbagger when I critique religion stories reported by network and cable news. Fish in a barrel. It’s just one step above criticizing the editorial strength of a college newspaper — and a rung below the college paper I worked for.
I completely understand why many mainstream journalists get frustrated when they try to write — in a fair and accurate manner — about the political force that is usually called the Religious Right.
As you would expect, your GetReligionistas have received quite a few breathless emails asking us why this site has had nothing to say about President Barack Hussein Obama’s plans to address the nation’s public-school students about the importance of discipline and education in their lives. Haven’t we noticed all of the protests by parents from sea to shining sea?
There are two kinds of people in this world who cannot avoid wrestling with the term “theodicy” — clergy (especially hospital chaplains) and reporters who are committed to covering religion news.
I opened up my Washington Post this morning and immediately thought about a forum that took place in my own Orthodox parish last night.
So the Republican candidate for governor of Virginia wrote a master’s thesis about family-friendly government policies. Make that traditional family-friendly policies. Written in the 1980s, it suggested that the government should craft policies that encourage traditional families (as opposed to “cohabitors, homosexuals or fornicators”). The Washington Post‘s coverage of Bob McDonnell thesis is at DEFCON 1 — just a couple days into it we’re now up to two-front page stories, three inside stories, two columns, one house editorial and one cartoon (as of yesterday, that is).
When elected officials promote BS about politics or world affairs or the state of the economy, it’s a reporters responsibility to let readers know. (Not saying it happens often enough, but that is the expectation.) But what about when a pol says something religious that doesn’t pass the smell rest?
Okay, I know readers are getting testy about all of the Ted Kennedy coverage (believe me, it’s wearing on me, too) but I have just one final story to highlight. It’s not about Kennedy per se but it uses his death as a hook to discuss the death of large Irish-American families in general. The New York Times story by Michael Wilson is worth highlighting because it does what so few stories about fertility do — it discusses how religion plays a role in the number of children women have. Huzzah! After making the case that Irish-American family size has plummeted, we’re told:
