Get Religion is a national and global journalism site focusing on how the mainstream press covers religion news in politics, entertainment, business and sports.
First, a word from the editor. In recent weeks, I have been tossing out roughly half of the comments that have been written about many of my posts here at GetReligion. Frankly, I have missed some that I should have spiked — seeing as how I do not live at my computer keyboard 24/7.
A regular GetReligion reader alerted us to an NPR “smear job” â as he described it â on his alma mater, Franciscan University of Steubenville in Ohio.
I have in my hand 57 cases of individuals who would appear to be either card-carrying members or certainly loyal to the Communist Party, but who nevertheless are still helping to shape our foreign policy.
The BBC’s inability to comprehend religion is not a new story at GetReligion. Often as not the corporation appears oblivious to the faith dimension of a story. I should say the BBC’s religion reporters are a professional lot and there are a number of fine specialty programs that treat faith issues well and when it focuses on religion it does a good job. It is outside the religion ghetto that the BBC fails to “get religion.”
Let’s face it. In the age of search-engine optimization, it’s oh so tempting to blog about a news story that allows you to put “patriarch” and “topless woman” in the same headline.
Anyone who follows the Catholic blogosphere knows that there was a major explosion last week sparked by some controversial — to say the least — remarks by Father Benedict Groeschel, a figure who has been much revered among conservative Catholics as an author, spiritual director, television personality and pastoral counseling professor at St. Josephâs Seminary in Yonkers.
Is this Spanish news magazine cover of Michelle Obama art or porn? Is it racist and sexist? Or is it a political fantasy of the noble savage, an incisive commentary on the centrality of Mrs. Obama’s sexuality in the presidential election campaign? Is it Granada I see or only Asbury Park in this profile of the First Lady?
About that high-profile claim that a political and cultural progressivism “literally bleeds through the fabric” of The New York Times:Â Anybody catch the story on Tyler Clementi’s parents leaving their evil, gay-bashing evangelical church?
One of the best strategies journalists can use when dealing with religious people — especially those with intense and even unusual, beliefs — is to give these folks some time and space in which to explain what they do believe (and often what they do NOT believe). I have been waiting for a major news publication to attempt this approach with supporters of Todd Akin’s stunningly strange beliefs on conception and rape, if such people can be found and accurately quoted.
