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When I saw the cover of the New York Times Sunday Magazine this week, I groaned. Beaming out from the pages in ridiculously campy, 1950s-style photos reminiscent of June and Ward Cleaver were two perfectly domestic gay men.
I confess that even my magazines stacked up during the papal visit. Thus, I was a week late getting to the epic Newsweek “Splitsville” cover story by David J. Jefferson on Baby Boomers and divorce in the symbolic Grant High School in the San Fernando Valley near Los Angeles.
The YFZ Ranch story was supposed to be about child abuse. No one will argue that when children are being abused, the state has broad powers to step in and stop the abuse no matter what justification is used to try to legitimize the abuse. No religious belief justifies any type of child abuse.
Could there have been two more dramatically different religion stories last week than Pope Benedict XVI’s first trip to the United States and the ongoing drama with the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints? It is completely understandable that almost all religion reporting resources focused on papal coverage, but I keep hoping that we’ll see some really good coverage of the ins and outs at the Yearning For Zion compound ranch in West Texas.
Anyone who knows anything about Baltimore — whether through news or through entertainment — knows that our inner-city neighborhoods are plagued by violence, with young, African-American males almost always on both sides of the guns.
Last week we discussed the need for reporters to distinguish between the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. In the comments, reader Michael Nielsen — a Mormon social psychologist — pointed us toward an op-ed he wrote for the Salt Lake Tribune that argued for improved information about the relationship of polygamy to the LDS church:
The papal visit is over, which means that we have only one major media ritual left to survive — a final wave of “what it all meant” features. It’s hard not to note that these stories will serve as logical bookends to those “what his visit will mean” features that ran just over a week ago. Please know that I am not knocking these journalistic rites. After all, I plan to write a wrap-up column myself, this week.
Actually, there isn’t a ghost in the Barack Obama “Bittergate” fuss. The religion element has been right there front and center (or to the left of center) all along.
As we continue to ride the papal tsunami, it appears that The Politico has another interesting story all to itself (unless I have missed it elsewhere and, if so, please correct me).
