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 spend a lot of time reading stories that miss an obvious religion angle or ones that don’t give enough space to explain some fundamentals. Our eyes widen at stories that do a nice job of explaining complex issues in under 1,000 words.
Well, the battle over same-sex marriage is right where everyone expected it to be at this point. As the New York Times analysis noted, it’s pretty clear that Judge Vaughn R. Walker’s opinion was written to an audience of one.
The Associated Press reported on the return to the pulpit of a Minnesota Lutheran pastor. He’d taken some time off after a gay publication crashed a support meeting for those facing unwanted same-sex attraction. The journalist did so under false pretenses and it created quite a bit of a firestorm because the pastor in question was a vocal opponent of changing church doctrine to affirm homosexuality.
Last year, I wrote a news story for Christianity Today titled “Modern-Day Lepers,” on the effort by churches to balance grace and accountability toward sex offenders:
A reader sent in this video from an award ceremony for the Heartland regional Emmy’s. In the longer clip (a portion of which is excerpted here for your viewing pleasure), there are all sorts of nominees from my native state of Colorado. I guess we’re Heartland.
Analyzing the media coverage of the Roman Catholic sex abuse crisis has been difficult simply because of the disgusting nature of the topic. But perhaps one of the most difficult articles to read was this April Newsweek story putting the abuse by priests in context of the larger problem:
Last year, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America voted to change its doctrine to allow gay clergy in committed sexual relationships. The Associated Press ran a story about one of the consequences of that vote:
Did someone up there fail to get the memo that the National Enquirer isn’t exactly the most trusted outlet on earth?
