Get Religion is a national and global journalism site focusing on how the mainstream press covers religion news in politics, entertainment, business and sports.
We have covered more than a few of the mainstream media stories declaring that female priests are being ordained in the Roman Catholic Church. Since the Roman Catholic Church doesn’t ordain females, we usually have a few nits to pick with the coverage.
Several years ago, I wrote a Scripps Howard News Service column about one of the more obscure disputes linked to the death, or death by starvation, of Terri Schiavo — whether or not her body should be cremated, against strong opposition of her devout Roman Catholic family.
While the news media has been focused on the sensational story of a breakaway Mormon fundamentalist denomination and its practice of polygamous marriage and allegations of child abuse, National Public Radio produced a solid two-part series this week on another significant religious tradition in the United States that allows for polygamy.
Yesterday I criticized a Los Angeles Times story on same-sex marriage. While the post received tons of comments, very few — very few — managed to stay on topic to the purpose of this blog. Some posters used the comment thread as a forum to argue against same-sex marriage. Many others resorted to calling supporters of traditional marriage bigots.
If I had to teach a child the concept of natural law, I would tell him or her to play Dungeons & Dragons.
You know, I laughed out loud when I popped open the first email asking me what I thought of this story. Then I did what any news junkie would do in this day and age. I slapped a silly headline on it and sent it to some of my friends.
Last week I criticized a Los Angeles Times story for spinning the results of a poll to make it seem like opposition to same-sex marriage wasn’t significant. Though supporters of traditional marriage had a 19-point margin of victory over those who want to redefine marriage to include same-sex unions, the Times referred to that margin as slim, narrow, “a bit” of a bare majority.
It’s very rare that I pick up a newspaper and read a sentence that leaves me shaking my head and muttering, “What in the heckfire did that mean?”
Sometimes I get discouraged at how much significant religious news gets completely ignored by mainstream media. Two weeks ago, one of the country’s most prolific hymn writers died. The death of Jaroslav Vajda was the kind of news that got passed around among fellow Lutherans and fans of his lyrics.
