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Before I sign off for the day, let me make note of a provocative essay by Father James Martin, a Jesuit, over at Slate.com. The headline tells you what this is all about: “Happy Crossmas! Why Easter stubbornly resists the commercialism that swallowed Christmas.”
To all GetReligion readers who are part of the Western church, let me say, “Happy Easter.” I hope you are all having a meaningful day discussing the resurrection power of Barack Obama’s recent speech on racism and its impact on healing the American soul.
Anyone who spends any time studying the history of journalism, especially the American model of the press, knows that reporters and editors really, really, really love what they call “facts.” Some historians have even said that journalists worship “facts.”
When I worked at the Charlotte Observer, a long, long time ago, one of the stars of the newsroom was a feature writer named Frye Gaillard. He’s been writing books for years now, but it seems that one of his earlier works was a bit prophetic.
Unless I have missed something (if so, please correct me), the Washington Post has a mere six news stories and columns in today’s paper about The Speech by Sen. Barack Obama. This may seem a bit out of line, but somewhere out there in evangelical-land there has to be a twisted, right-wing novelist or a screenwriter who is thinking about writing some kind of sequel for the “Left Behind” series. This was one amazing speech.
Another day, another bomb and 43 more deaths. And this time there seem to be serious questions about what precisely happened near the Imam Hussein shrine in the Shiite holy city of Karbala, which is located inside one of the tightest security zones in post-surge Iraq.
Day after day, your GetReligionistas receive a steady stream of email from people who seem to pay little attention to what it is that we actually do at this weblog.
At this point, I do not think that GetReligion will be creating its own special web site to cover the upcoming visit by Pope Benedict XVI to the United States (at least, to the parts of the U.S. that really matter).
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.
