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The continuing journalism saga of, 'Will someone please explain Christianity to ...'

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The continuing journalism saga of, 'Will someone please explain Christianity to ...'

Welcome of episode three (yes, the podcast) of the ongoing saga of mainstream journalists wrestling with the picky details of Christian tradition and doctrine (that whole Bible thing, you know) about the death, resurrection and ascension of Jesus.

To catch up on this drama, you may want to glace at "Here we go again: Will someone please explain Christianity to the Associated Press?" and then "Seeking correction No. 2: Will some please explain Christianity to the AP photo desk?"

Concerning that second item, I must report -- sadly -- that, as of this morning -- the Associated Press website still contains the inaccurate photo tag line that reads:

The renovated Edicule is seen in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, traditionally believed to be the site of the crucifixion of Jesus Christ, in Jerusalem's old city Monday, Mar. 20, 2017. A Greek restoration team has completed a historic renovation of the Edicule, the shrine that tradition says houses the cave where Jesus was buried and rose to heaven. (AP Photo/Sebastian Scheiner)

To repeat the main point here, Christian tradition (that whole Bible thing, again) teaches that -- after his resurrection -- Jesus spent 40 days with his disciples, was seen by crowds, etc., before his ascension into heaven. Journalists do not have to believe these doctrines. They do, however, need to report the beliefs accurate in stories linked to these sites, biblical passages, holy days and rites.

At the moment, reporters are veering into this territory, of course, because Holy Week and Easter are getting closer. Editors and producers know that it's time to put something into print and video about Easter, a holy day that isn't nearly as commercial and fun (in secular terms) as the season previously known as the Nativity of Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

That was the starting point for this week's "Crossroads" podcast. How many times have you seen stories linked to Easter that either mess of the basics of Christianity or actually attack them? We are talking about television specials, covers of major newsweeklies and so forth and so on.

'Tis the season, you know.


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Seeking correction No. 2: Will some please explain Christianity to the AP photo desk?

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Concerning the strange tale of the Associated Press and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre: I have some good news, some bad news, a disturbing update and one very good question from a reader.

First the good news.

If you will recall, my earlier post on this topic -- "Here we go again: Will someone please explain Christianity to the Associated Press? -- asked for a correction in an AP story that mixed up some crucial details in 2,000 years of Christian beliefs about the resurrection and ascension of Jesus. This is the kind of information that isn't hard to get online or, for that matter, in a Bible at the newsroom reference desk.

Well, I am happy to report that this story, at the main AP site, now opens with a clear correction, which is even flagged in the headline. The correction states:

JERUSALEM (AP) -- In a story March 20 about renovations at the tomb of Jesus, The Associated Press reported erroneously that the Edicule is revered by Christians as the site where Jesus rose to heaven. Tradition says the Jerusalem shrine is the site of Jesus' resurrection, not the ascension to heaven.

The crucial issue, of course, is whether the newspapers that carried this report, in America and around the world, will run this same correction. GetReligion readers who saw this report in their local newspapers may want to let us know in the comments section.

What about the bad news?

Well, it does appear that someone still needs to explain basic Christianity to the photo-desk at the main Associated Press office. You see, as if this morning, the tag line for the main photo released with this fine feature still reads as follows:


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Here we go again: Will someone please explain Christianity to the Associated Press?

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Maybe it's time to cue the theme from "Jaws" at copy desks in major newsrooms.

We are halfway through the season of Lent, and you know what that means. Once again, we are approaching the most important days on the Christian calendar, as in Holy Week and Easter. Editors should note that Easter in the West (Gregorian calendar) and Pascha in the churches of the East (the older Julian calendar) are on the same date this year.

This time of year is dangerous for editors because the odds rise that they will need to handle news stories that are supposed to contain accurate references to church history and basic Christian beliefs. This has, in the past, been a challenge in some newsroom, even at the most elite levels of the news food chain. Take, for example, the New York Times and its ongoing struggle with the details of the Resurrection.

This brings us to an Associated Press news feature about the efforts to restore the main shrine in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem. See if you can spot the problem here:

JERUSALEM (AP) -- The tomb of Jesus has been resurrected to its former glory.
Just in time for Easter, a Greek restoration team has completed a historic renovation of the Edicule, the shrine that tradition says houses the cave where Jesus was buried and rose to heaven.
Gone is the unsightly iron cage built around the shrine by British authorities in 1947 to shore up the walls. Gone is the black soot on the shrine's stone façade from decades of pilgrims lighting candles. And gone are fears about the stability of the old shrine, which hadn't been restored in more than 200 years.

Did you see the problem?


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Evangelicals and Jews: Religion & Politics report has a thoughtful profile on famous Orthodox leader

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Some time ago, there was an opening for a religion reporter-like person to work at something new on the Washington (DC) landscape: A John C. Danforth Center on Religion and Politics. It is named after the former U.S. senator from Missouri who is also an Episcopal priest.

I didn’t know any of the folks who were hired at the center, but recently I stumbled across its site and hit upon some intellectually meaty think pieces. For example, there’s a piece on newly confirmed Education Secretary Betsy DeVos by someone who appears to understand Calvinism and why DeVos probably isn’t a Calvinist at all. There’s a piece on President Donald Trump and “militant evangelical masculinity” by a Calvin College professor.

But what really interested me was another piece; this one on “How an Orthodox Rabbi became an Unlikely Ally of the Christian Right.” It begins:

We are in a third world war,” said Shlomo Riskin, slamming his fist on the table. We were sitting in a windowless room in the D.C. convention center, and Riskin, an Orthodox rabbi, was explaining how he had ended up here, at the annual summit of Christians United For Israel, giving a speech to thousands of conservative evangelicals.
Riskin kept banging on the table. “If you have eyes to see, extremist Islam has taken over Islam. And this is the third world war!”
Riskin is one of the most influential rabbis of his generation. Now an Israeli, he was born and raised in Brooklyn. As a young man, Riskin voted for Democrats. He marched with Martin Luther King, Jr., in Selma. He officiated at a young Elena Kagan’s bat mitzvah and advocated for women’s rights. Over time, he developed a reputation as a religious progressive.
In the last decade, Riskin has quietly developed another project: outreach to Christians, and especially to conservative American evangelicals. His most important partnership is with John Hagee, a Texas megachurch pastor whose organization, Christians United For Israel (CUFI), claims a membership roll larger than that of AIPAC. Like AIPAC, CUFI advocates for policies that it sees as pro-Israel and organizes activists and donors across the country.

I remember Riskin’s controversial move to the West Bank in the early 1980s when he was leading the influential Lincoln Square Synagogue in Manhattan.


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As Democratic support for Israel wanes, will American Jews abandon their political home?

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Buried in a new Pew Research Center poll on a broad-range of American political concerns is a finding that has the potential to radically scramble American Jewry's long association with the Democratic Party. Not surprisingly, the lightning-rod Israeli-Palestinian conflict is at the root of this.

The finding? For the first time, it appears that Americans who are registered Democrats are as statistically likely to favor the Palestinians as they are Israel.

Ladies and gentleman, this is potentially big news -- assuming the polling is accurate.

Not because of the small number of Jewish voters who exist on a national scale relative to the overall number of registered American voters (Jews account for only about 2 percent of the entire American population).

But because of what this could mean for Jewish campaign contributions, Jewish political activism and Jewish voting in future presidential, congressional and other contests in New York, California, Florida and other states with large Jewish concentrations. (I'm referring here to non-Orthodox Jews; the 10 percent of so of American Jews who identify as Orthodox already largely support Republican politicians.) 

Political reporters at mainstream American news outlets, as far as I can tell, paid comparatively little initial attention to the survey finding. I suspect this is because of the avalanche of stories they've been producing on the outgoing Obama presidency and the incoming Trump administration.

Even Israeli and American Jewish outlets initially paid less attention to the Pew finding than I would have imagined, probably for the same reason cited just above.

Hey, religion reporters. Why not pick up the slack?


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Washington Post's Jewish-Art-About-Jesus 'taboo' extends to theology, too

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That Jews have issues in considering the life and ministry of Jesus of Nazareth should come as little surprise. Christ, as Jesus was later called, challenged the spiritual orthodoxy of his day, and remains a challenge to the faith of millions. The bottom line: If Jesus is the Messiah, then Jews (and everyone else) has to make a decision to accept or reject Him.

In Israel, where, cultural sensitivities are high, then, it’s no surprise that “Jewish art challenges the taboo of Jesus,” as the Washington Post noted recently.

Nevertheless, it is a little surprising that at the very epicenter of news coverage of this issue in Jewish and Christian experience, there’s practically no discussion of, well, theology.

Diving in:

At the center of the Israel Museum’s newest art exhibit stands an imposing, life-size marble figure of Jesus. The sculpture, titled “Christ Before the People’s Court,” would not be out of place in a church in Rome.
Yet in this depiction, the Christian savior wears a Jewish skullcap.
The sculpture, created by Russian Jewish artist Mark Antokolsky in 1876, is part of a collection of more than 150 artworks by 40 Jewish and Israeli artists who have used Christian imagery to challenge long-held taboos in both communities. It showcases the evolving attitudes of Jewish, Zionist and Israeli artists toward a figure whose place in Jewish history has been negotiated and reinterpreted over more than two millennia.
It is a risky statement for an Israeli museum.
Throughout history, Jews have traditionally shunned Jesus and his gospel. And while the Holy Land might be his accepted birthplace, for Jews in the modern state of Israel there is often resistance to learning about or even acknowledging Christianity.

Again, that's no surprise: As the Post notes, the better part of the past two millennia have been occupied by those blaming Jews for the death of Christ, culminating in the Shoah, the attempt to exterminate the Jewish race undertaken by Germany's National Socialist, or Nazi, party.


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Repeat, repeat, repeat: Israeli settlements are news even when there's no news to report

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Repeat, repeat, repeat: Israeli settlements are news even when there's no news to report

The Washington Post, Los Angeles Times and, of course, The New York Times, lead the pack when it comes to ongoing coverage of Israel and the Middle East by elite American newspapers. Some of their reporting is excellent, some of it is done poorly, and some of it is just repetitive.

That's about what one should expect, because journalists succeed and fail, I'd say in the absence of any hard evidence, roughly as much as any other human subset. 

Let's dissect the repetitive. And, yes, I'm well aware that given how often I post on Israel issues for GetReligion, I'm in danger of being repetitive myself. But, here goes anyway.

This week, the Post ran a news feature that it's editors (or at least those who produced Tuesday's edition) saw fit to give four-column, above-the-fold, page-one display in the paper's print edition. That, despite the story providing no new information.

The question is why?

Headlined, "A new wave in the West Bank?", the news feature struck me as a rehash of events that the Post and everyone else has widely covered -- which is what Donald Trump's election victory means for Israel's West Bank settlement project.

The bottom line is that Trump, and his designated appointee as U.S. ambassador to Israel, David Friedman, appear set to give Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu a free-hand to continue settlement construction. That's the opposite of what President Barack Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry want.

If you support the settlements, Trump and Friedman are a welcome good-news story. If you oppose the continued building, as I do, they're utterly bad news.


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Parade of 2016 yearenders: The Forward tunes in dizzying set of Jewish opinions

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When you think of The Forward, you probably think of a progressive Jewish website with a flair for interesting story angles on politics and trends in Judaism -- secular and religious -- with the occasional pop-culture and/or social media spin.

In other words, at the moment, "50 Things To Fear From the Trump Administration" right next to "5 Easy Hangover-Relieving Recipes to Make Today."

That's the ticket.

Well, The Forward also has a new corner of the website called Scribe, in which readers and commentators from all over -- 250 contributors from six continents -- offer their take on the world. It launched in July and the editors marked the end of 2016 -- naturally -- with a Top 10 items list.

Now, I am not going to list all of them. Click here to head over and see this feature for yourself. However, I am going to show you a sample of the list, in part to demonstrate that this is not your normal liberal Jewish blitz of content.

Now, it starts with something quite newsy and also rather predictable, in light of news trends linked to You Know What in this election year:

1: Anti-Semitism in America is Nothing New. Don’t Deny Jewish History and Culture by Calling Us “White”

The next item is also from the edgy progressive, multi-cultural, even virtue signalling side of things. As in:

2: Jews Should Register as Muslims 
But then we hit the third item in the list. Sit down before clicking on through to get to this one!
3: I’m a Jew, and I’m a Member of the Alt-Right


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Part II: New Year’s observations on matters religion writers will want to be watching

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Let's continue with some of the themes we were discussing in the previous Religion Guy Memo, in which I offered some predictions on what kinds of news items and trends religion-beat specialists will want to anticipate during 2017.

Watch for the U.S. Supreme Court to schedule the oral arguments in three complex cases consolidated under Advocate Health Care Network vs. Stapleton. At issue: Special pension exemptions for religious organizations other than churches. The Atlantic headline for a piece on this says the outcome “could bankrupt religious schools and hospitals.”

The speaker list for the customary Jan. 21 interfaith service at Washington's Episcopal cathedral the day after President Trump's inauguration will be worth coverage and comment. Will any ranking Muslim leaders agree to participate? Will any observant Jews appear even though it's the Sabbath day? Will Southern Baptist spokesman Russell Moore or other #NeverTrump clergy be invited?  

The NRB International Christian Media Convention in Orlando Feb. 27–March 2 will be a handy place to collect evangelical hallelujahs (and any lamentations) about the Trump Presidency. Headliners include Kelvin Cochran, fired as Atlanta fire chief over anti-gay statements; Alan Sears, whose Alliance Defending Freedom litigates religious-liberty cases; the Rev. Jonathan Falwell, who leads father Jerry’s local church; and radio pundits Steve Deace and Hugh Hewitt.

Yes, Virginia, there are pro-evolution evangelicals, and biologos.com plans a March 29 – 31 conference in Houston about “the rich harmony between modern science and biblical faith.” Speakers include British New Testament scholar N.T. Wright, Wheaton College Old Testament Professor John Walton (author of the controversial “Lost World of Adam and Eve”), and Christianity Today Executive Editor Andy Crouch.

Speaking of Bible debates in the news.


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