Journalism

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NPR puff piece on transgender church leaves lots and lots of predictable gaps

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Recently, I wrote about one unusual congregation (Mark Driscoll's Trinity Church) starting up in Phoenix and now here's another, at the opposite end of the theological pole. The United Church of Christ is one of the country’s most liberal Protestant denominations and one of their clergy seems to have found a way to minister to transsexual youth. This NPR piece is on the church he started back in 2009 that has, to one degree or another, taken off.

I think it’s fine to spotlight unusual ministries. What I have a problem with is when the presentation is totally uncritical. That is, the people who attend this church are always loving. The families they come from -- and other Christians -- are always hateful. There are no complex details.

It starts thus:

Some churches have become inclusive of gays and lesbians, but for transgender people, church can still feel extremely unwelcoming. A congregation in Phoenix is working to change that by focusing on the everyday needs of its members — many of whom are homeless trans youth.
It starts with a free dinner every Sunday night with donated homemade and store-bought dishes.


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Media struggle to grasp what friends (including females) meant to St. John Paul II

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Media struggle to grasp what friends (including females) meant to St. John Paul II

If you know much about the young Polish actor and philosopher Karol Wojtyla, then you know that his path to the Catholic priesthood was quite unusual, surrounded as we was by the horrors of the Nazi occupation and then the chains of a puppet regime marching to a Soviet drummer.

In his massive authorized biography of the St. Pope John Paul II, "Witness to Hope," George Weigel argued that a key to understanding Wojtyla is to grasp the degree to which his faith and spiritual disciplines were shaped by the lives of strong laypeople and his many friends -- male and female -- who surrounded him in academia, the underground theater and similar settings.

Once he became a priest, he spent years as a campus minister working with young adults during his graduate studies and beyond.

In other words, if you want to picture the life and times of the future Pope John Paul II (and you want to understand the material covered in this week's "Crossroads" podcast) then it's wrong to picture him in some kind of pre-seminary ecclesiastical assembly line, surrounded by other young men headed to holy orders and, yes, celibacy.

Instead, picture him trying to explain his priestly vocation to his girlfriend. Picture him carrying a canoe on a camping trip, explaining Catholic teachings on marriage and sexuality to college students of both genders (creating friendships that in many cases lasted his whole life) and holding Mass as far as possible from Communist police. Check out this sprawling made-for-TV bio-pic starring John Voight and Cary Elwes.

In other words, the more you know about Karol Wojtyla, then the less likely you are to be stunned by the wink-wink BBC reports about his years of "secret letters" to a female philosopher friend.


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Both sides now: USA Today does a decent job covering LGBT flap in a Florida town

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Gol' durn, Florida is always full of surprises. In reporting a controversial school board meeting over LGBT rules, USA Today -- and its state affiliate Florida Today -- stuck pretty much to basic reporting, as opposed to editorial writing.

Even better, the national report is a nearly word-for-word re-post of the original Florida Today story, rather than some Beltway gloss. LGBT matters can get pretty heated, and so can school board meetings. So when they collide, it ain't always easy just to report. These stories do have a flaw or two, but they generally show a satisfying fairness and respect for all sides. We'll look at the flaws in a bit, but the top alone rates a hat tip:

MELBOURNE, Fla. -- Big crowds came out for a Tuesday evening meeting about a proposed non-discrimination and equal employment policy for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people in Brevard Public Schools.
After more than 90 LGBT policy opponents spoke to the school board, the board voted to kill the proposed policy, and said it would hold a public workshop on LGBT issues down the road.
Nearly 100 people signed up to speak at the meeting, and most of those who spoke were in opposition to the LGBT policy.
Friar Demetri Tsigas of Melbourne, a Greek Orthodox priest, said that the opposition of people of faith like himself was something school board members should heed. "You can see the spirit of the town here," Tsigas said.  "This is not San Francisco, folks. This is Brevard County."

Friar? That's off the mark. However, that statement is something of a surprise, starting the quotes with a Greek Orthodox priest, rather than the typical "fundamentalist" who is then held up to scorn.

It is crucial to note the ratio of people attempting to speak in opposition to the policy, as opposed to those who defended it. This was a very tense, charged meeting.


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Actor Terry Crews repents, again, on porn -- leading to God-haunted news coverage

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So let's walk through the basics on this story, shall we?

What we have here is a video in which a former National Football League player, now a mid-level star in network television (and advertising), talks very openly about his struggles with pornography. He puts the video on Facebook and it goes totally viral.

A key element in this story is the fact that his wife of 25 years -- Rebecca King-Crews -- has stayed by his side during this fight with addiction. She is a former beauty queen and a famous gospel singer, in her own right. The two also made news when they decided, to help build communication and intimacy in their marriage, to take a 90-day "fast" from sex.

In the viral video, Crews talks about the fact that his wife stood with him because he was "repentant" and now, several years after the crisis, he wants to make it his "mission" to help men break this addiction, to take steps to get help rather than just "asking for forgiveness."

The video, targeting his "Facebook family," does not talk about his faith in explicit terms -- but even the most simple Internet search makes it clear that Crews and his wife are active Christians.

So now, with that information in mind, watch the ABC News clip at the top of this post.

What is missing? Do you sense a God-shaped hole in this report?


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In battle of gay rights vs. individual conscience in Missouri, here's a surprising winner

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When it comes to political fights pitting gay rights vs. religious freedom, so much mainstream media coverage skews one way.

It's not terribly difficult to guess which way (here at GetReligion, editor Terry Mattingly even coined a special term for it).

This USA Today story this week is typical of the slanted (read: left-leaning) approach that many purportedly balanced news stories take concerning LGBT issues. In this piece, the gay-rights advocates are presented as rational and only concerned about fighting discrimination. The conservative religious types toting Bibles are depicted as "ugly" and "nasty." At least that's my impression after reading the national newspaper's take.

But hey, let's focus on the positive, not the negative, today and critique a solid, well-rounded news story from The Associated Press.

This piece benefits from three important "p" adjectives: Precise language. Proper framing. Purposeful balance.

Let's start at the top:

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) — Missouri voters, who were among the first nationally to adopt a constitutional ban on gay marriage, could get a say later this year on whether to grant greater religious protections to some business owners and individuals who object to same-sex marriage.
A proposed constitutional amendment that got its first hearing Tuesday in a Senate committee would prohibit government penalties against those who decline to provide goods or services "of expressional or artistic creation" for same-sex marriage ceremonies and celebrations.
The Missouri measure doesn't list specific types of business people who would be covered — though it comes as bakers, florists and photographers in other states have faced legal challenges for declining to provide services for same-sex weddings.


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Alabama Muslims: Feature on converts doesn't ask many (or any) follow-up questions

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Confession time: I used to write stories almost as wide-eyed as yesterday's feature on Muslim converts in Alabama.

I wrote up Muslim criticisms of Christianity. I retold their feelings about baleful attitudes from other Americans. I did, however, try to look critically at their claims of up to seven million believers in the U.S.

But see, it's two decades later, and mainstream media should have moved on. And I suggest that the Alabama Media Group, with seven regional editions, carries a heavy responsibility for perceptive reporting, not just writing up notes.

This particular article starts as a sensitive, detail-rich feature of the Alabaman Muslims: how they live, how they view presidential candidates, how they think other Americans view them. Al.com even finds a counter-intuitive lede:

Allie Larbi sounds like a Donald Trump supporter.
The Mobile resident supports building a giant wall on the U.S.-Mexico border and scrapping birthright citizenship. Syrian refugees, in her own words, should either be blocked from entering the United States or let in only to be housed in isolated refugee camps.
"I have what I like to turn around and call American views," said Larbi. "This is a great country and it needs to stay that way."

Larbi naturally takes offense at some of Trump's other statements, like "mandatory registration for Muslims, a ban on Muslim travel to the United States, or shooting Muslims with bullets dipped in pig's blood."  We'll get back to her in a moment.


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Oh no he di-int! Major city's council shocked by prayer mentioning Jesus and the devil

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Government-sanctioned prayers at the beginning of public meetings don't typically draw a lot of attention. Generally, journalists sleep right through them. 

As you might imagine, it takes a humdinger of a prayer to grab the attention of a major newspaper like the San Antonio Express-News.

So, give Theo Wolmarans credit for that.

Wolmarans' secret for making headlines with his prayer? Hold onto your britches: He mentioned Jesus and the devil.

Stop the presses!

A local pastor who prayed Thursday at the start of the City Council meeting declared only two types of people exist on Earth — those who work for God and those who work for the devil.
The invocation, the standard kickoff to all Thursday council meetings, typically is an inclusive prayer.
Religious leaders from various denominations and religions are invited by individual council members and the mayor. The pastors, rabbis, imams and others mostly invoke God for his wisdom. Some mention Jesus in passing.
Rarely do they offer prayer that excludes entire groups of people. But Pastor Theo Wolmarans from Christian Family Church of San Antonio seemed to do just that in his brief invocation.
“Father, we thank you for the privilege we have for being your children. We know that there are many different races and colors and creeds and languages in our world, of which you are the creator of all of these,” he said during the brief invocation. “But even so, out of all of your creation are your children because only those who accept Jesus as their lord and savior are born into your family.
“And so, when you look down upon us today, you see two kinds of people only — those who believe in you and those who don’t know you. Those who believe in you are your children, and you work through your children to bring peace and love and blessing to the earth,” he said. “And the devil works through those who don’t know you to bring confusion and strife and division, the work of the enemy, because he came to steal, to kill and to destroy.”


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Al Jazeera America's demise and American concerns about Islam and Arabs

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Al Jazeera America's demise and American concerns about Islam and Arabs

Soliciting and editing opinion pieces was part of my job many times during my almost 50 years around the news and communications business. Being a highly opinionated sort myself, I enjoyed that work quite a lot.

However, I've often been unsure about just how much to pressure an op-ed writer to add to, better justify or delete something they wrote.

In the end, I generally left the final decision to the writer. An op-ed is, after all, the writer's opinion about a subject and what they think is most important about it. It's the writer's prerogative to cherry pick from among the "facts" available on whatever the issue. The editor's job is to edit for style, grammar, originality, organization, libel and slander, personal animus and logical cohesiveness.

It's true that this can -- and often does -- result in one-sided, unfair and even intellectually dishonest copy. But that's the nature of the beast. Don't like it? Well, if you're in a position of authority you can always decide not to publish a piece or solicit another writer to produce one more to your liking. Or you can write one yourself (and hopefully find someone willing to publish it, but that's another issue).

A recent New York Times op-ed about the soon-to-close Al Jazeera America is a case in point.  (I'll get more precise shortly.)

One of the main reasons GetReligion was founded was to note this sort of imbalance when it shows up in basic, hard-news copy, specifically as it relates to religion news.


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Talking Dallas, twisters, theodicy and the Book of Job -- from one theological perspective

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Spring is approaching in the Sunbelt, which means one thing to people in places like North Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Arkansas and Western Tennessee.

Here come the tornadoes.

As someone who was a child in Wichita Falls on April 3, 1964 (and several other relevant dates), I know quite a bit about the astonishing, random, mysterious power of twisters. If you were looking for a natural phenomenon that can jump start a debate about "theodicy" -- the technical term for "God in the dock" arguments about good and evil -- a tornado will do the trick.

What does it mean when a twister destroys a neighborhood and leaves a church standing? What does it mean when the church is destroyed, as well? No, I don't think this is a denominational thing.

To cut to the chase, I was glad when The Dallas Morning News did something interesting the other day, offering a question-and-answer piece that ran with this headline: "Texas Faith: How a loving God can permit killer tornadoes." It's well worth the time and raises some interesting questions and hints at ONE TAKE on some answers. Hold that thought.


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