Get Religion is a national and global journalism site focusing on how the mainstream press covers religion news in politics, entertainment, business and sports.
What a campaign season this has been. It’s amazing how much religion has played a part this year — from Huckabee’s surprising win in Iowa to Mitt Romney’s big religion in America speech. And now this, as reported by Marc Ambinder at The Atlantic:
There have been more than a few stories about Jeremiah Wright, Barack Obama’s spiritual mentor and pastor. A survey of broadcast media left me a tad unimpressed with the journalistic treatment. It seems news outlets are either exploiting the political rhetoric of Wright without any context or soft-peddling it to the extreme.
Barack Obama supporters won’t like this, but let the word go forth. Reporters should write more stories about Obama’s former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, Jr., and his relationship with the Democratic presidential candidate. Yes, I say this even after Wright left the campaign.
One more time, into the whirlpool of questions about how newspapers should handle stories that raise moral questions, yet questions that are — for many readers — may or may not not religious.
Texas’s El Paso Times had an interesting story Tuesday on a development in the state’s law that initially seemed to require public schools to teach a non-sectarian Bible course that would be an elective taught by teachers who received some sort of specialized training.
A few of you noted the relative lack of coverage of both the kidnapping and death of Chaldean Catholic Paulos Faraj Rahho, Archbishop of Mosul. His body was discovered yesterday.
In January, I noted that the Las Vegas Review Journal had scooped the national press with its story that a pastor had endorsed Barack Obama from the pulpit, a violation of federal law. Now reporter Jeff Goldblatt of FOX News has done the same, concluding that Obama’s controversial pastor also crossed the line.
I have no idea if there is a religion ghost somewhere in the sad story of Ashley Youmans Rae Maika DiPietro Alexandra Dupre — the 22-year-old “escort” better known as “Kristen” in the icky story of Gov. Eliot Spitzer of New York.
Good reporting generally involves some time, coordination and good footwork. Forget secret meetings in Washington, D.C., parking garages. Some of the best stories sit underneath reporter’s noses. A little creativity and thinking outside the box can reveal an aspect of a community that everyone appreciates regardless of which side of the issue they fall.
