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There’s something curious about the way the media have been handling the difficult and complicated story of Rifqa Bary. She’s the Ohio teenager (pictured here) who fled to Florida after she converted to Christianity over concerns her Muslim father might kill her. We last looked at this story when CNN inexplicably referred to the girl as “Muslim” even though the whole point of this saga is that she’s not.
The facts of the case are clear and brutal, according to a number of reports in New York media. Here’s an online New York Times report, as a starter.
So, are we getting close to increased mainstream media coverage of (a) the content of Florida Gator superstar Tim Tebow’s faith, (b) the impact of that faith on how people (including reporters) perceive him and (c) the impact of that perception on, oh, his chances to receive another Heisman Trophy?
You’ve heard of religion reporters becoming atheists. And you’ve heard of religion reporters becoming agnostic. But have you heard of religion reporters becoming pastors?
The New York Times City Room blog has a story about the fourth goat in four months to be found wandering near the Hutchinson River Parkway in the Bronx. We learn that animal rescuers were befuddled by the wandering goats because they didn’t have metal tags in their ears or the spray paint that indicates they’re from live markets.
I’m not sure GetReligion has ever highlighted a gap in religious coverage before. But I think I’ve find just the occasion. And my blind hope is that the reasoning behind this omission was a collective decision to ignore the problem — in this case, Jon Gosselin, the former co-star of “Jon & Kate Plus 8″ and a fallen hero for American evangelicals — and pray he will just go away.
When I first saw the painting here by Jon McNaughton, I thought it was one of the best distillations of civil religion I’d seen. While most American civil religion focuses on generic Jewish and Christian themes, I wondered if this painting didn’t reference some particularly Mormon doctrine.
You remember Bishop Raymond Lahey don’t you, the Catholic bishop who was caught in a Canadian airport security line with very naughty materials on his laptop computer?
