Get Religion is a national and global journalism site focusing on how the mainstream press covers religion news in politics, entertainment, business and sports.
When you think of someone doing right by the Church of Cyprus, you probably don’t think of Boy George. And yet there he was, returning an icon he’d bought (without realizing its origin) in 1985, years after the Turkish invasion. The BBC writes:
It’s NFL playoffs time again and, of course, the hated Pittsburgh Steelers are once again poised to knock the Baltimore Ravens out of the playoffs. If this horrific reality comes to pass (again), there is a very good chance that the deed will be done by the Steelers’ mane man, superstar safety Troy Polamalu. Personally, I think Polamalu is the best player in professional football and, yes, that includes the quarterback up in New England.
Once again, we head back into my stash of GetReligion guilt, that hefty folder of stories that I know I need to address but I am not sure what I need to say. In this case, I am talking about one of the early “what is this all about” stories linked to the rising violence in Egypt.
Every now and then, elite organizations such as the New York Times run strange, colorful stories about those strange people who live out there in flyover country, by which I mean the Bible Belt and other locations between the Hollywood sign and the Hudson River.
It must be so confusing to try to cover the churches of the East in the context of North America. Things are so complicated here in the New World.
I went to church on New Year’s Eve, as many do. In the Lutheran church, we mark the eve of the Feast of the Circumcision of our Lord. Many black Protestant congregations have Watch Night services, commemorating the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation. Many other Christians simply mark the new year. It’s so easy to take for granted the peace and ease with which we attended church in the United States.
Trust me, I have the greatest of sympathies for general-assignment reporters who find themselves forced to wade into the complex details of doctrine, rite and history that are frequently served up by day-to-day events that transpire on the religion beat.
Were you enjoying the fact that the media had more or less dropped any coverage of the proposed Islamic Center near ground zero? Well, it’s back in the news with a couple of updates. There’s the rumor that King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia might want to buy shuttered St. Vincent’s Medical Center and move the Park 51 mosque to a new Islamic cultural center he would build on the site (story in the New York Post).
Let me start by offering a “Merry Christmas” to all of you pro-tradition Christmas lovers who are celebrating the full season between Dec. 25th and the all-to-overlooked Feast of the Epiphany on Jan. 6th. We are talking about two crucial days that form bookends that support one another.
