Get Religion is a national and global journalism site focusing on how the mainstream press covers religion news in politics, entertainment, business and sports.
Pope Benedict XVI is on a visit to Portugal. As is his custom for trips outside the Vatican, he takes reporters’ questions while in-flight. One of the responses has gotten quite a bit of media coverage. Here’s how Reuters put it:
The following information is sad, but true. It is very common for mainstream journalists, especially wire-service reporters in foreign bureaus, to have to write about events that they do not have the time or money to cover in person.
When I think about great magazine features about religion news in the age of GetReligion, some of the first stories that leap into my mind are headlines like “The Jesus War,” which probed the roots of Mel Gibson’s “Passion” play on film, and “Jesus in the Classroom,” which offers an unusually balanced and nuanced account of the battles over religion and American history in the elite public-school classrooms of Cupertino, Calif.
The New York Times ran a huge page one feature on Anwar al-Awlaki. He’s the American-born Muslim cleric now active with al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula. He had ties to several of the 9/11 terrorists but his work with Fort Hood shooter and the Northwest Flight 253 underwear bomber have gotten renewed attention from the American government. President Obama recently authorized the use of a drones or other means to take him out — even though he’s an American citizen. And that was before we learned that last week’s Times Square bomb attempt was inspired — but apparently not coordinated — by al-Awlaki.
Earlier this week, the New York Times ran a story about how the Vatican handled abuse claims against the Rev. Marcial Maciel Degollado, the founder of the worldwide order Legionnaires of Christ. The story, which focuses on Vatican politics, hasn’t gotten as much play as the previous Times story attempting to link Pope Benedict XVI to an abuse case in Wisconsin. But this story also focuses on then-Cardinal Ratzinger’s role in handling the many claims against Father Maciel.
As it turns out, the Times Square bomb may not have been set by someone who was mad about Obamacare.
The Associated Press has a story about three Church of England bishops who traveled to Rome last week to discuss the possibility of joining with the Catholic Church:
A reader alerted us to the airing of a PBS Frontline documentary on “The Dancing Boys of Afghanistan”. I had the chance to watch it earlier in the week and it is absolutely riveting. You can watch it online and I encourage you to do so if it has already aired in your market.
Reuters is definitely my favorite source for international religious news. But this story out of Srinagar, India, could use some help. Headlined “Visitors banned from Kashmir’s Jesus shrine,” it tells about a local Muslim fight over a shrine. And in so doing, it gives terribly short short shrift to the most fundamental Christian teachings:
