Politics

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An anguished 'nothing in particular' believer shakes up country music establishment

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An anguished 'nothing in particular' believer shakes up country music establishment

Oliver Anthony counted about 20 listeners when he performed earlier this summer at a produce market in coastal North Carolina.

That was before August 8, when radiowv posted his "Rich Men North Of Richmond" video on YouTube. More than 37 million views later, as of earlier this week, the unknown country singer from Farmville, Virginia, has become a culture-wars lightning rod.

When he returned to the Morris Farm Market, near Currituck, he faced the massive August 13 crowd and read from Psalm 37: "The wicked plot against the righteous and gnash their teeth at them; but the Lord laughs at the wicked, for he knows their day is coming. The wicked draw the sword and bend the bow to bring down the poor and needy, to slay those whose ways are upright. But their swords will pierce their own hearts, and their bows will be broken."

Anthony then sang his NSFW (not safe for worship) hit about suicide, depression, hunger, drugs, politics, child sex trafficking and dead-end jobs.

"I've been sellin' my soul, workin' all day / Overtime hours for bulls*** pay / So I can sit out here and waste my life away / Drag back home and drown my troubles away," he sang, with the crowd shouting along. The chorus began: "Lord, it's a damn shame what the world's gotten to / For people like me and people like you / Wish I could just wake up and it not be true / But it is, oh, it is / Livin' in the new world / With an old soul."

"Rich Men North Of Richmond" debuted at No. 1 in Billboard's Top 100, the first time ever for a new artist without a recording contract and mainstream radio support.

"The song was immediately politicized, even though there have always been country songs with singers lamenting the state of their lives and the state of America," said David Watson, a theologian and country-music fan. He is academic dean of United Theological Seminary in Dayton, Ohio, near a Rust Belt poverty zone with historic ties to Appalachia.


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Thinking about faith and family in the first debate between some 2024 GOP hopefuls

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Thinking about faith and family in the first debate between some 2024 GOP hopefuls

President Joe Biden has talked about the battle for the soul of the nation. In fact, he gave a speech about just that in September 2022, two months before the midterm elections, at Philadelphia’s Independence Hall, in order to rebuke Donald Trump and his divisive politics.

“Donald Trump and the MAGA Republicans represent an extremism that threatens the very foundations of our republic,” Biden, a practicing Catholic, said at the time.

Nearly a year later, the leading Republican presidential candidates came together in Milwaukee for the chance to take on Biden in the November 2024 election. The headline-grabbing elephant in the living room: Former President Donald Trump did not take part.

What emerged from these eight candidates at the Fiserv Forum was an often-heated two-hour debate in which they weren’t afraid to bring up faith and family as a reason why Biden’s America has been a failure. The Fox News debate was the first of the GOP primary season. Trump, meanwhile, staged an interview with the exiled Fox News superstar Tucker Carlson, which was streamed live on the X platform (formerly known as Twitter).

While the candidates vying for the White House agreed America is undergoing a crisis, they differed on exactly why. It set the stage for what will be a very interesting primary and one where issues surrounding faith and family won’t be ignored by millions of Americans, even if they are downplayed in mainstream media coverage.

Faith and family are not new talking points for GOP candidates. It’s a trend that dates back to the 1980s during the Ronald Reagan era and has continued with the rise of the Christian Coalition and, in recent years, the large support of white evangelicals for Trump, especially in two-party national showdowns. The U.S. Catholic bishops have also become more outspoken on many moral and social issues.


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Podcast: Journalists need to ask if Colorado has 'good' and 'bad' religious preschools

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Podcast: Journalists need to ask if Colorado has 'good' and 'bad' religious preschools

I was never a Ronald Reagan fan, but — let’s face it — he would have to rank No. 1 among American politicians when it comes to having the “gift of gab.”

Thus, with a tip of the hat to the Gipper, let me make this observation: You know that there are church-state experts — on the new illiberal side (cheering) and on the old-liberal side (groaning) — who are watching recent events in Colorado and saying, “There you go again.”

This brings us to this long, long, wordy headline from The Denver Post that served as the hook for this week’s “Crossroads” podcast (CLICK HERE to tune that in). Read this one carefully:

Denver Archdiocese sues Colorado over right to exclude LGBTQ people from universal preschool

State’s non-discrimination requirements “directly conflict with St. Mary’s, St. Bernadette’s, and the Archdiocese’s religious beliefs,” the lawsuit says.

The Post team has, naturally, framed this case in precisely the manner chosen by Colorado officials, while paying as little attention as possible to recent decisions made by the (#triggerwarning) U.S. Supreme Court.

In particular, journalists may want to look at that recent decision —  Carson v. Makin. The key: The high court addressed the state of Maine’s attempts to give public funds to parents who sent their children to secular or religiously progressive PRIVATE schools, but not to parents who picked private schools that support centuries of Christian doctrines on marriage and sex (and other hot-button topics, such as salvation, heaven and hell).

Now, back to the Denver Post:

The Denver Catholic Archdiocese along with two of its parishes is suing the state alleging their First Amendment rights are violated because their desire to exclude LGBTQ parents, staff and kids from Archdiocesan preschools keeps them from participating in Colorado’s new universal preschool program.

The program is intended to provide every child 15 hours per week of state-funded preschool in the year before they are eligible for kindergarten. To be eligible, though, schools must meet the state’s non-discrimination requirements.


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Are white evangelicals devoted to Fox News? Do atheists flock over to MSNBC?

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Are white evangelicals devoted to Fox News? Do atheists flock over to MSNBC?

One of my favorite things to do when the weather is nice is walk my dog. She’s a seven-pound Yorkshire terrier named Lucy. Oftentimes she wants to take a stroll around the neighborhood in the early evening and it’s a good excuse for me to stand up from the computer and actually move around a bit.

It helps to know that I live in an older neighborhood in the Midwest where many houses were built close together and only 10 feet from the sidewalk. So, I can easily see in someone’s living room when I am walking by with the dog.

I love to catch a glance at what’s on their television. Lots of times it’s the St. Louis Cardinals, but that’s a less frequent occurrence as the team has been terrible this year. But if it’s not baseball, it’s usually the news. I see a little MSNBC, a bit more of CNN, but a whole lot of Fox News. If you go to a local doctor’s office, it’s what is on the television in the waiting room. It’s really the default channel for most public spaces in rural, deep-red America.

I am not a scholar of media and politics, but there have been dozens of books written about the 24 hours news cycle and the rise of polarized outlets like Fox News and MSNBC and the impact that they are having on society and politics. But I’ve never really seen a whole lot written about religion and media consumption. It’s time to change that.

The Cooperative Election Study asks people if they have watched a variety of media outlets in the prior 24 hours. They get all the legacy networks (NBC, CBS, ABC) but also the news channels like FNC, MSNBC and CNN. The results are fascinating and every time I look at the heat map, I seem to find a little nugget that I didn’t see the previous time.

The big networks still do pretty well, honestly. A decent chunk of America is watching NBC, CBS and ABC on a regular basis. And what’s interesting is that there’s not a ton of variation from top to bottom. For example, ABC hovers between 30% and 50% for basically every group (aside from Black Protestants). The other networks are in that same range, too. There’s pretty wide penetration across all kinds of religious groups.

I was surprised how broad the viewership is for CNN.


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How AI may be able to improve journalism when it comes to reporting on Catholicism

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How AI may be able to improve journalism when it comes to reporting on Catholicism

One of the things I enjoy about the summer is catching up with people I haven’t seen all year to discuss news, politics and culture. Since so many of my friends are in the news business, inevitably the state of the mass media comes up as a topic.

The one constant subject that has arisen from these conversations is the rise (and potential threat) of artificial intelligence. Specifically, the topic of how AI can (and will) replace humans who report and write for a living.

While machines have yet to replace all writers, the threat is real. This isn’t just limited to journalists. AI has impacted Hollywood (look at the current writers strike), education (from grade school to college) and the retail industry. And yes, journalism is up there to when it comes to an industry seen as under threat, according to a poll conducted earlier this year.

AI a either a new technological monster or a friend to journalists. The industry is divided by the issue. Like the internet back in the 1990s, AI is both astonishing and perplexing.

How has AI and machine learning impacted journalism? Can it make it better or worse? These are just two valid questions people in newsrooms are asking. The question here at GetReligion is how AI could affect religion-beat work and, in this case, the state of Catholic news and publications.

For starters, consider that there will be 10 new AP Stylebook entries to caution journalists about common pitfalls in coverage of artificial intelligence. Here’s what the Associated Press said:

While AP staff may experiment with ChatGPT with caution, they do not use it to create publishable content.

Any output from a generative AI tool should be treated as unvetted source material. AP staff must apply their editorial judgment and AP’s sourcing standards when considering any information for publication.


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Plug-In: Jesus didn't pad his resume, but this top Southern Baptist leader did just that

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Plug-In: Jesus didn't pad his resume, but this top Southern Baptist leader did just that

It’s National Shameless Plug Day.

Or maybe it’s really not, but I still want to share an in-depth feature I did on faith nights hosted by Major League Baseball teams. I traveled to San Diego and Los Angeles to report this story for ReligionUnplugged.

But that’s enough shameless plugging for now.

This is our roundup of the top headlines and best reads in the world of faith. We start with the resignation of a top Southern Baptist Convention official.

What To Know: The Big Story

Out immediately: Willie McLaurin, interim president and CEO of the Southern Baptist Convention’s Executive Committee, resigned Thursday.

“In a recent resume that I submitted, it included schools that I did not attend or complete the study,” McLaurin said concerning his decision.

The short version: He lied.

Not the first time: McLaurin is just the latest SBC Executive Committee head to leave amid controversy, as Religion News Service’s Bob Smietana points out:

McLaurin became interim president after Ronnie Floyd, the previous president, resigned in October 2021 after months of controversy over the SBC’s sex abuse crisis. Floyd’s predecessor, Frank Page, resigned in 2018 due to misconduct. 

Regarding McLaurin, the Washington Times’ Mark A. Kellner notes:

The first Black man to head the group that handles matters for America’s largest Protestant denomination outside of an annual business session, the pastor and leadership coach was considered a leading contender for permanent appointment.


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Thinking, with The Free Press, about what Brooklyn folks don't 'get' about Iowa

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Thinking, with The Free Press, about what Brooklyn folks don't 'get' about Iowa

Let’s do something different with a “think piece” this week.

What we’re going to do is watch a short video and then, hopefully, GetReligion readers can leave a few comments about what they saw or, more importantly, what they didn’t see.

The video itself comes from those savvy urbanites at the must-follow website/Substack feed called The Free Press. What’s going on in this light-hearted, chatty, laugh-to-keep-from-crying offering? The goal was summed up in this epic double-decker headline:

Pork Chops! Politics! The Free Press Goes to the Iowa State Fair. …

Brooklynite Ben Kawaller dives headfirst into livestock, fried food, and the great political divide at America’s annual country circus.

Kawaller states, right up front, that he knows a lot more about musical theater than he does agrarian life (and, needless to say, hip eateries in and around Park Slope don’t serve deep-friend Oreos). So why would he want to spend a week hobnobbing with Iowa farmers?

Read the headline again.

We’re talking politics and the Iowa primaries, of course. Thus, Kawaller offered this online confessional:

Along with showcasing some of the state’s most impressive agriculture, the fair has, since the 1970s, become a de rigueur campaign stop for political candidates. Over the course of this year’s fair, which runs until Sunday, August 20, no fewer than sixteen presidential hopefuls have appeared or are expected to. My visit coincided with some big ones: Florida governor Ron DeSantis was there on Saturday, only to be upstaged by Donald Trump, who also may have arranged for the flight of an aerial banner urging “Be likable, Ron!” (You have to hand it to him: the man knows how to taunt.) 


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Podcast: 'Young men are puttin' themselves six feet in the ground' and other suicide news

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Podcast: 'Young men are puttin' themselves six feet in the ground' and other suicide news

Here’s a sad question for the day: How many opioid overdoses could be classified as suicides?

There’s no way to know, is there? If people are trying to bury their pain, depression and anxiety in pills or needles, how would public officials know — without a suicide note — that an overdose was intentional? What if victims are on a path suggesting that they simply don’t care whether they live or die?

Suicides involving guns are much more definitive.

This brings us to some of the issues discussed during this week’s “Crossroads” podcast (CLICK HERE to to tune that in), which focused on a totally religion-free Associated Press story that ran with this headline: “US suicides hit an all-time high last year.”

As you would expect, this report featured lots of tragic numbers and then tried to answer the “why” question in the classic journalism mantra “who,” “what,” “when,” “where,” “why” and “how.” In this case, the “why” and the “how” factors were one and the same.

GetReligion readers will not be surprised that I suggested there were cultural, moral and religious questions looming over this topic. Since I live in Southern Appalachia, I offered some research tips for how religion-beat journalists — if editors were to give them a chance — could find ways to broaden this topic to include trends (such as opioid overdoses) linked to the suicide numbers. Hold that thought.

First, here is the AP overture:

NEW YORK (AP) — About 49,500 people took their own lives last year in the U.S., the highest number ever, according to new government data posted Thursday.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which posted the numbers, has not yet calculated a suicide rate for the year, but available data suggests suicides are more common in the U.S. than at any time since the dawn of World War II.


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Coverage of book war at tiny library in Dayton, Washington, settled for voices on one side

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Coverage of book war at tiny library in Dayton, Washington, settled for voices on one side

Dayton is a cute little town in Washington state’s southeastern corner that hovers near the region’s fabled wine industry.

I stayed there one New Year’s Eve while skiing at the nearby Bluewood resort and let me tell you, the social scene in downtown Dayton was deader than a doornail. Maybe everyone had gone to nearby Walla Walla to party.

Which is why I was curious when the Seattle Times recently ran a piece about the townspeople possibly voting its tiny library out of existence.

DAYTON, COLUMBIA COUNTY — Book battles are raging across the nation, but none have carried the kind of stakes as the one here in Dayton, a one-stoplight farming community in the southeastern corner of Washington.

For the county’s only library, the battle has turned, quite literally, existential: Voters will decide in November whether to shut it down.

The library, which has occupied the same modest brick building a block off Main Street for 86 years, is at risk not because of a lack of funding or a lack of demand for its services. Instead, it could shutter because of a yearlong dispute over the placement of, at first, one book, then a dozen and now well over 100, all dealing with gender, sexuality or race.

More than 100 books?

I’m curious what the annual book-buying budget is for this place. This area is deep red-state Washington, not freewheeling Seattle, so where is the audience that is demanding that many books of this kind on the local shelves?

It would be the first library in the country to close because of a dispute over what books are on the shelves, according to the American Library Association.

“That is the end of the library as we know it,” said Jay Ball, who owns a local auto shop and chairs the library’s board of directors. “It’s insane, it’s just insane.”


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