Evangelicals

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Seriously? New York Times story on GOP schism is silent on 'pew gap' issues (updated)

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As you would expect, the political experts at The New York Times have noticed that, once again, war has broken out between the populist and country-club wings of the Republican Party. Thus, they produced a very interesting piece that ran under the headline, "For Republicans, Mounting Fears of Lasting Split."

This story will be interesting, to GetReligion readers, just as much because of what the editors left out, as well as that they put in. They correctly stress that, this time around, the GOP leaders face fundamental differences on a host of crucial issues such as immigration, rising tides of refugees and how far to go in battles with radical forms of Islam.

It is also interesting that, over and over, the piece equates the candidacy of Sen. Ted Cruz with that of billionaire reality-TV star Donald Trump. The implication is that they are appealing to many of the same voters and that there isn't much difference between the two.

But what is missing? To be blunt: Religion.

So, do you remember the "pew gap"? Apparently, it is completely gone or is now irrelevant in GOP debates, as well as the nation has a whole. Is that really true in the GOP? It must be true, because the Times team -- in this crucial piece about the threat of a GOP split -- completely ignores religious and moral issues (even as the U.S. Supreme Court faces case after case linked to religious liberty issues).

So what is the "pew gap"? Many people used to incorrectly claim that religious people vote for Republicans and non-religious people vote for Democrats. While it is true that highly secular and religiously unaffiliated voters are crucial in the Democratic coalition, there are also religious believers active in doctrinally liberal flocks -- which makes them a perfect fit in the modern Democratic Party. However, a crucial "pew gap" fact is that liberal religious groups tend to be smaller in terms of numbers.

If you are looking for the roots of the "pew gap" -- the fact that people who frequent pews are more likely to vote Republican -- then it's hard to top the 2003 Atlantic Monthly essay called "Blue Movie," written by Thomas Byrne Edsall. This is a flashback, of course, to a campaign dominated by Bill Clinton, not Hillary Rodham Clinton.


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Stephen Prothero wades into Wheaton wars: 'Are Allah and Jesus the same God?'

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The drama at Wheaton College rolls on. I have held off talking about it, in part because -- after decades in Christian higher education -- I know that it will be hard for reporters to get behind the scenes and find out what is actually going on.

Why? Because money and donors are involved? Of course. Name a controversy in higher education -- left or right, secular or religious -- that doesn't involve donors.

Because believers don't like bad public relations? Yes, that's true. But privacy laws are also important at private schools. What can Wheaton leaders say about this case without legally violating the privacy of the professor at the heart of all this?

Are there First Amendment issues linked to freedom of religion and freedom of association? Yes, and what about that 9-0 U.S. Supreme Court ruling in 2012 backing the right of doctrinally defined educational institutions to hire and fire their own leaders, based on doctrinal criteria?

Because politics are involved? Yes. But it's crucial for reporters to realize that the political battles here are built on issues of doctrine. Lots of Christians -- including evangelicals -- do not agree on how to answer this question: Is the God of the Hebrews, the God Jesus intimately called "Father," the same as Allah, the radically transcendent God of Islam? What do Muslims say?

There is another factor in this timeline. The New Testament reports that Jesus said, "I am the Father are one." Jews, of course, reject the Christian Trinity, but in doing so they are arguing with Jesus and the founders of the early church -- all Jews. Islam, of course, comes after the earthly ministry of Jesus and explicitly (check out the inscriptions in the Dome of the Rock) rejects that God has a Son.

One other factor that journalists must grasp: There is no one definition of "evangelical" and there is no one prevailing authority that gets to call the doctrinal shots. Remember what the Rev. Billy Graham -- the most famous Wheaton graduate, ever -- told me long ago, when I asked him how he defined "evangelical"?


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Big foreign datelines: London (think Canterbury) next week, Moscow long-term ...

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Big foreign datelines: London (think Canterbury) next week, Moscow long-term ...

Though U.S. media often downplay foreign news, astute religion writers will be closely watching London next week and Moscow in the longer term.

London:  Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby has called a Jan. 11–16 meeting with 37 fellow “primates” who head the national branches in the Anglican Communion.

Some analysts consider it a make-or-break moment on whether this global body of as many as 85 million adherents can hang together. Most stateside journalists won’t make the trek to England but will want to develop Yankee angles with the assistance of  The AP, Reuters, YouTube, British news dailies and Anglican websites, official and otherwise.

This is the latest and possibly the culminating event after years -- decades really -- of wrangling over biblical authority and interpretation, especially whether to accept partnered same-sex priests and bishops, and gay marriages. The fight pits the liberal Episcopal Church in the U.S., led by brand-new Presiding Bishop Michael Curry, and Archbishop Fred Hiltz’s Anglican Church in Canada, over against large and growing national churches in Africa and the “Global South.” Welby’s own Church of England is stuck somewhere in between.

Welby hopes he can maintain some titular leadership as the “Communion” evolves into a looser federation to allow leeway on faith disputes. But doctrinal conservatives seem prepared to reject such schemes and walk away. Already they have formed the Global Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans (“GAFCON”) as an alternative international body that claims to represent the majority of world Anglicanism’s membership, especially in terms of believers currently active in pews.

GAFCON is chaired by the archbishop of Kenya along with primates from the provinces of Congo, Nigeria, Rwanda, South America, Sudan, and Uganda, plus Archbishop Foley Beach of the Anglican Church in North America -- a schism from the U.S. and Canadian denominations -- who’s supposed to be present for at least some of the London discussions.


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Los Angeles Times: Christians finding totally cool new ways to learn Hollywood stuff!

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Let's say you wanted to write a newspaper piece about a big, complex topic, maybe something like Christians trying to find doorways into work in Hollywood. There are two responsible ways to do this kind of news story.

You could take a comprehensive approach and attempt to update the status of the full story, backing up several decades and demonstrating that this is not a new story. You would contact the key players, old and new, and go for a real update on the big picture.

Second, you could do a modest piece that looks at a new institution that is getting into this field, a new school or a new professional program that claims to have a fresh approach. Then you briefly -- three to four paragraphs or so -- mention that there are a host of other people who have been doing this work for (that word again) decades. Perhaps you ask the veterans to critique the current state of this work and evaluate this newcomer in their home turf.

But here is what you do not do, especially if you are writing the The Los Angeles Times, for heaven's sake, which is supposed to "get" Hollywood. You do not write a shallow, barely researched piece about a newcomer on the block and then proceed to ignore all of the professionals who have been working in this field (one more time) for decades.

Alas, this third option is precisely what the Times offered the other day, under this snippy headline: "Selling Stardom: A Christian path to Hollywood."

The story focuses on a program called "Actors, Models & Talent for Christ," which grew out of a talent-search company in Atlanta. Readers are told that it jumped into this new line of work when "owner Carey Lewis became a religious Christian." Here is what passes for the thesis and summary material in this story:


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McClatchy story on DC Bible museum gets some very creative editing by the Seattle Times

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It started on a Saturday afternoon when I was gazing at a print version of the Sunday Seattle Times. It was actually the “bulldog” edition, so-called because it comes out the day before. Before in the days before the Internet, this was the term used to describe the earliest edition of the Sunday paper that was sent to remote locations statewide so that theoretically, at least, everyone in the circulation area had some version of that big edition to look at.

I noticed this headline: “D.C.’s Bible museum will celebrate Christian Scripture.”

Now, last time I looked, the much maligned museum was planning to cover the Old Testament, aka the Hebrew Bible, as well as the New Testament. My colleagues Jim Davis and Bobby Ross covered the Washington Post’s article on this. So what’s this “Christian Scriptures” bit? Why not “Jewish Scriptures”?

What I turned up was one of the weirder instances I’ve run across of creative editing by wire desks. First, there was the original story filed Dec. 24 by a writer for McClatchy News Service:

WASHINGTON -- The National Mall may be the nation’s front lawn, but even at holiday time the museums that line it are only lightly decorated with Christmas trees and lights and not with any religious displays.
But a new privately-owned museum is going up just a few blocks away –- the Museum of the Bible –- that only wants to celebrate Scripture. The $400 million project two blocks south of the National Air and Space Museum doesn’t have to worry about laws or rulings that keep religion and state separate.
The museum is the brainchild of Steve Green, president of Hobby Lobby, the privately-owned Oklahoma City crafts chain that follows its owners’ evangelical beliefs, including closing its 600 stores on Sundays.

Now, that’s not what was in the Seattle Times.


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Flashback 2015: Jewish news, an all-pope Top 10 list and trends on evangelical left

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OK, here is one final set of some Top 10 religion stories lists for the now distant 2015. If you have missed the previous installments, click here and then here to back up a post or two and catch up. There was also an end of the year "Crossroads" podcast.

One of the reasons that journalists dig into these kinds of lists, especially those prepared by leaders in specific religious flocks, is to learn about stories that may not have made headlines at mainstream news sites -- yet.

So here are three lists of this kind. Once again, please put any 2015 Top 10 lists that I missed in our comments pages.

We will start with A. James Rudin, a name familiar to all journalists who cover events and trends among Jews in North America and elsewhere. This Top 10 Jewish news events list was prepared for Religion News Service, but the link is to The Washington Post. You have Bernie Sanders, Nostra Aetate and a rabbi scandal or two. However, his top story is one that has been growing in importance for more than a decade, one sure to grow in importance with the rise of the Islamic State.

1. Anti-Semitic attacks escalate across Europe.
In January an Islamic terrorist killed four Jews inside a Paris kosher market, and in February a terrorist killed a synagogue guard in Copenhagen. The number of French Jews moving to Israel grew during the year.

Then there was this story, which our own Ira Rifkin flagged early on:

3. The BDS campaign gathers force.

In June, the General Synod of the United Church of Christ approved a resolution calling for the denomination to divest and boycott certain companies doing business with Israel.


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'Nasty' Ted Cruz dares to quote the Bible! Washington Post is stunned and strikes back

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So let's say that you are a political reporter from The Washington Post and you are covering a rally by Sen. Marco Rubio and, in the middle of remarks to his inner-ring of supporters, he says something in Spanish. The crowd responds with warm applause and cheers.

As a responsible reporter, would you (a) do an online search and find out what this phrase actually meant, (b) talk to someone from the Latino community to learn what the phrase meant, in context, and why it drew cheers or (c) both of the above? It is also possible that a major newsroom like the Post would have assigned someone to cover the Rubio campaign who speaks Spanish, but that is another issue.

Oh wait, there is another option. You could also pull the phrase out of context, assume that you knew what it meant and then, online, make a snarky remark about it. That will show 'em.

This is kind of what happened the other day with some behind-the-scenes remarks by Sen. Ted Cruz. The problem was that this event was covered by someone who appeared not to know anything about language drawn from that obscure book called The Bible. Here's the top of the story:

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) told volunteers ... he believes the Republican presidential contest will be decided in the next 90 days, but warned them to get ready for a nasty ride.
"I want to tell everyone to get ready, strap on the full armor of God, get ready for the attacks that are coming," a hoarse-sounding Cruz told volunteers on a conference call. "Come the month of January we ain’t seen nothing yet."
The call, part thank you and update to volunteers and part fundraising pitch where listeners could press a button to give a donation, comes after Cruz's campaign announced it raised nearly $20 million last quarter as the Texas Republican ascended in the polls in both Iowa, the nation's first voting state, and nationally.

Then there was this official Post remark on Twitter, promoting this news report:


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Flashback 2015: Revealing Top 10 lists from Religion Dispatches and Patheos Evangelical

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So far, your GetReligionistas have shared quite a few Top 10 story lists marking the end of the year -- like here, here, here and here, with an attached podcast here. These have ranged from the Religion Newswriters Association list to that of the Associated Press. I found it interesting (commentary here) that the top AP story -- period, as in the top story in the whole world -- was a religion news story, but that wasn't the top story in the RNA poll. Go figure.

Obviously, I find these lists fascinating, in part because they show us (a) just how complex the world of religion news really is and (b) the unique points of view (which can, in some cases become biases) that affect how scribes and editors see the world of religion news. There is much to learn in these lists, both for news professionals and news consumers.

In the next couple of days I will be posting a number of additional lists covering religion news in 2015, from a variety of different points of view.

Please let me know if I missed one or two that you would like to see posted.

Let's start with the Religion Dispatches list of the "Ten Religion Stores That Went (Mostly) Missing in 2015." The whole idea here, of course, is that these are stories that, from the point of view of Peter Laarman, SHOULD have received more coverage in the past year.

Read them all. But here are a few that caught my eye:

2. The struggle of the Black Church to come to terms with #BlackLivesMatter.
In some cities there has been visible conflict between Old Guard pastors (many of whom still identify with the 20th century civil rights movement) and the New Guard of fearless youth, many of whom are not shy about showing contempt for the pastors.


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Spiritual leaders we lost in 2015: Comparing the coverage at RNS and NPR

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Want a sense of time passing?

Read some of the many lists of "famous dead" cranked out this week. The Religion News Service does its part with a brisk list of 23 spiritual leaders who departed in 2015. Let's see how well they did.

RNS opens with a nice, measured lede:

They preached and inspired. They wrote and taught. Some lobbied in the halls of government. Others toiled to protect the environment and educate the young. Several died at the hands of persecutors.
Here is a list of notable faith leaders — and a champion of secularism — who left us in 2015.

From there, the list goes by date of death, rather than alphabetical order. First is Andrae Crouch, who merged several musical genres -- gospel, rock, country, even Hawaiian -- to electrify crowds and get even secular people to listen. As RNS reports, Crouch's songs not only found a home in hymnals, but won Grammys.

RNS seems to have taken care for broad religious representation. I count four Catholics, two Muslims and two United Methodists. I also see one each of several others -- Jewish, Baptist, Buddhist, Hindu, Episcopalian, Church of Christ, African Methodist Episcopal.

The list includes a brief rundown on each person, which is a service even for readers like myself, who are more than casually interested in religion. Some of the names make you go "Oh, yeah, I remember him!" People like:


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