Get Religion is a national and global journalism site focusing on how the mainstream press covers religion news in politics, entertainment, business and sports.
Reading about presumed Republican presidential candidate John McCain’s outreach to so-called evangelical voters and “leaders” is like reading the 2004 presidential coverage only in reverse. Reporters should take whatever efforts McCain’s campaign makes to “outreach” to evangelical leaders with a large grain of salt.
We are into the second wave of media coverage of the death of NBC’s Tim Russert, featuring stories that are one step away from the actual memorial service and the mainstream press memorials. Some of these events are going to be linked to more complex, personal aspects of Russert’s career — such as his faith.
It seems that if reporters don’t know much else about Roman Catholics, they should know something of what they believe about the Eucharist. Catholic belief in the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist has various supporting dogmas, including Transubstantiation and the Permanence of Presence and the Adorableness of the Eucharist.
Unless Mitt Romney gets picked to be John McCain’s VP nominee, the mainstream media may completely forget about that major news story from earlier in the primary season: Mormonism. Without that news hook, most reporters have moved on to different topics — debunking Christianity and shark attacks, or something.
Several days ago, two MSM reporters described Barack Obama as a centrist on the abortion issue, or at least wrote that his position differed from that of liberal pro-choice activists. Their news hook was an interview that Obama gave to a magazine aimed at young evangelicals.
On one level, it is obvious that the Church of England’s decision to raise female priests to the episcopate is a big news story. I mean, click here for a Google News tour of the coverage and here for a regular Google collection. Or, if you wish, here’s the New York Times report.
In the many news articles on the death of former North Carolina Republican Senator Jesse Helms, little is said outright of the social conservative politician’s religious faith. There are certainly hints of it, but even in the Baptist senator‘s home state newspapers, most reporters failed to mention anything of note regarding religion.
There is nothing the media like more than to sensationalize undeserving stories. Usually this involves either the disappearance of young, attractive white women or alleged revelations about Jesus. in the latter category, we’ve read that Jesus walked on an ice floe (not water), that he wasn’t crucified in the manner in which people think, that Jesus’ father was a Roman soldier named Pantera, not Joseph, and that Jesus didn’t die on the cross so much as pass out after being doped up.
One of the reasons why I wish reporters would focus more on religion news that’s apolitical is because when they do, the stories turn out so much better. Take this great piece from Gabe Oppenheim of the Washington Post. The news angle for the story is that a local woman won the top documentary prize at the Student Academy Awards in Los Angeles a few weeks ago. But that’s about the least interesting aspect to the whole story.
