Urban ministry

Fiducia Supplicans news flashback: 5-star case of the medium being the message

Fiducia Supplicans news flashback: 5-star case of the medium being the message

Here is a fact from life on the religion beat. Several times a year, a religion-beat reporter is going to be approached by an editor who wants him or her to make a photo-assignment for a religious holiday or a story with some kind of religion hook.

They don’t want Southern Baptists in gray suits (or even megachurch tropical shirts). They don’t want Pentecostal believers in church clothes with their hands in the air. (Well, if there were snake-handlers in urban zip codes near elite newsrooms, they’d be big hits with newsroom photo-desks.)

Reporters know what editors want — pictures of Catholic rites. Catholics photograph well. That’s why there are 100 movies about Catholics for every one movie about run-of-the-mill Protestants. (Episcopalians will do, every now and then, especially since they always are several decades ahead of Rome on the historic “reforms,” such as female bishops, etc.)

This brings me, belatedly (I’ve had other things on my mind), to Fiducia Supplicans and what makes that complex and, I would argue, intentionally confusing document so newsworthy and historic.

This was a papal chess move that, in the fine print, stressed that its creators did NOT want to produce photo ops that looked like same-sex marriages. But the big news is that it did precisely that in the media that matter the most — newspapers and television networks in New York City and other deep-blue media environments.

It’s all about the staged visuals. If you look at Fiducia Supplicans from a photo-op perspective, the key New York Times story was perfect. The headline: “Making History on a Tuesday Morning, With the Church’s Blessing.

These blessing rites had been taking place in Europe for several years now (and privately, we can assume, in North America). The elite press ignored those events, even though — from a church history perspective — they were just as important as blessing rites In. New. York. City.

But anything in New York City, with America’s most important (and Pope Francis favored) priest in a starring role is obviously more important than something in Germany. Right? Now it’s time to celebrate.


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Dear Associated Press editors: The story of Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter includes lots of faith

Dear Associated Press editors: The story of Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter includes lots of faith

When former President Jimmy Carter describes his life he almost always mentions each of these subjects — his wife, Rosalynn, their shared Christian faith, community service and the Bible.

In his mind, these subjects are linked. Could someone please pass that information on to the political-desk editors of the Associated Press?

The bottom line: It is impossible to write about the Carters without paying some attention to the topics that mattered the most to them, as opposed to the subjects that matter the most to political-desk journalists. If you know lots of people who have followed the Carters for decades (I even have a nephew named “Carter”), you know the role that their evolving, progressive Baptist convictions played in their story.

The death of Rosalynn Carter this weekend gives news consumers a first draft of the coverage that will follow the looming death of the 99-year-old former president, who remains in hospice care.

Much of the Carter coverage today is starkly secular and faith-free. How is that possible?

But let’s start with a positive note, care of a nuanced passage in the New York Times obit that offers an outline of what journalists will find if they explore Carter territory with open eyes and even the slightest interest in the faith elements therein. Read the following carefully

Reared in the same tiny patch of Georgia farmland, 150 miles south of Atlanta, they were similar in temperament and outlook. They shared a fierce work ethic, a drive for self-improvement and an earnest, even pious, demeanor. Their Christian faith was central to their lives. Both were frugal. Both could be stubborn.

After Mr. Carter lost his re-election bid in 1980 to Ronald Reagan, he and Mrs. Carter embarked on what became the longest, most active post-presidency in American history. They traveled the world in support of human rights, democracy and health programs; domestically, they labored in service to others, most prominently pounding nails to help build houses for Habitat for Humanity.


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Bonus thinking about a trend reporters need to 'get' -- that nondenominational boom

Bonus thinking about a trend reporters need to 'get' -- that nondenominational boom

What about that elephant in the religion-beat living room?

I’m talking about nondenominational evangelical and charismatic Protestantism. It’s everywhere. It shows up in story after story, from the January 6th riots at the U.S. Capitol to discussions of the future of the Southern Baptist Convention and other big religion name brands.

In the past week or two, here at GetReligion, we had: “NPR discovers megachurches! But, wait, there is one new wrinkle in this old story.” Or how about: “Many churches are vanishing, while others are growing. Trends worth covering?” Then again: “How many believers exit their childhood faith? And where are they headed these days?

I could go on. But nondenominational churches play a major role in lots of stories and trends worthy of coverage.

So, as a weekend “think piece,” let me point readers to a must-read Christianity Today piece that Bobby Ross, Jr., plugged in last week’s Plug-In feature. Here’s the headline on that Daniel Silliman feature: “Nondenominational Churches Are Growing and Multiplying in DC.

Now, this is a story about religion inside and close to that Beltway thing. But it’s also relevant to people trying to understand that nondenominational elephant (sorry for the political animal image). Thus, the overture:

The District Church could be a Baptist church. The lead pastor, after all, grew up as a Southern Baptist missionary kid and still has a lot of ties to that denomination.

It could also be Anglican, with the way it leans into liturgy and the church calendar. Or a social justice church, with its focus on the inequality so visible in Washington, DC, or charismatic, with its emphasis on prayer and sensitivity to the Spirit.

Instead, the church is a little bit of all these things. It is nondenominational, pulling together different Christian streams to minister effectively to the young white professionals who have moved to work in the capital, as well as the upwardly mobile Nigerians and South Koreans who’ve emigrated to the seat of the United States government.


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NPR discovers megachurches! But, wait, there is one new wrinkle in this old story

NPR discovers megachurches! But, wait, there is one new wrinkle in this old story

Not that long ago, National Public Radio came to my backyard. The headline on the resulting GetReligion post summed up what happened: “NPR comes to hills of Tennessee and sees exactly the religion trends that you would expect.”

This was another one of those post-coronavirus pieces that talked about the challenges to the mainline churches that are dear to the heart of spiritual seekers in prestigious newsrooms. The NPR team headed straight to progressive East Tennessee churches — many already in decline — in which the pews are full of people who have NPR as the main pre-set on their car radios.

The result was valid, but so, so, so incomplete. As I wrote at the time:

It’s absolutely true that there are declining churches here in the mountains of East Tennessee, especially during COVID-tide. That’s an important story. The problem is that there are also growing churches in the region (yes, including my own Orthodox parish, which has grown at least 25% in the past three years) and that’s a detail that makes this story more complex.

Well, I am happy (sort of) to note that NPR journalists have now discovered (or rediscovered) two major trends that began back in the 1970s and, maybe, they see some new connections. The headline on this feature: “Megachurches are getting even bigger as churches close across the country.”

The two old trends: (1) Megachurches are real and growing and (2) much of this is linked to the stunning growth of nondenominational evangelical and charismatic Protestantism in American life (and around the world).

I will stress, once again, that this is a valid story. I am less convinced that this is somehow linked to life after the COVID-wave, although it is certainly important that entrepreneurial megachurches were already wired for online worship, while most denominational churches were not.

Anyway, here is the long overture, which includes several themes:

Something clicked for Marlena Bhame when she first stepped into Liquid Church about four years ago. She'd been searching for something more spiritually dynamic and meaningful than the faith tradition she'd grown up in, or the various others she had tried out over the years.


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New York City has evolved into a complex, tense 'post-secular' cultural chess board

New York City has evolved into a complex, tense 'post-secular' cultural chess board

Early in his church-planting work in New York City, the Rev. Tim Keller focused on what he called the Center City, which started in lower Manhattan, near Wall Street, and extended past Central Park.

The Presbyterian Church in America seminary professor camped in the old Tramway Diner under the 59th Street Bridge at 2nd Avenue, asking New Yorkers probing questions about their lives. He dug into the socialist Dissent Magazine to learn the city's secular lingo.

But New York was already evolving in 1989, when Redeemer Presbyterian Church opened its doors two weeks after Easter, said Tony Carnes, leader of the "A Journey through NYC Religions" website.

Changes began in the 1970s in the city's boroughs "with more internationals arriving from all over," including Global South cultures in which "no one doubts that faith is an important part of life," he said, reached by telephone. "It took time to see these changes affect Manhattan, but they did."

In 2000, Carnes' team found -- through a face-to-face census with church leaders -- 120 evangelical congregations in the Manhattan Center City. That number reached 197 a decade later, 251 in 2014, 308 in 2019 and are expected to near 370 in 2024.

"We know there are others, because we hear things all the time," said Carnes. "We just haven't found them all -- yet."

For decades, researchers considered New York City a lab for the brand of secularism defined by Harvard Divinity School historian Harvey Cox, author of the influential "The Secular City" in 1965. In a famous quotation, he noted: "Secular Humanism is opposed to other religions; it actively rejects, excludes, and attempts to eliminate traditional theism from meaningful participation in the American culture."

However, at sidewalk level it's obvious that there are "two New Yorks," noted Carnes. While secularism remains dominant in mass media, academia and other parts of the cultural establishment, the reality is more complex in Queens, Brooklyn, the Bronx, Staten Island and now parts of Manhattan.


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Podcast: Can New York City's arts avengers save a tiny, but ultra-valuable, mainline church?

Podcast: Can New York City's arts avengers save a tiny, but ultra-valuable, mainline church?

I was stunned (I kid you not) that editors at The New York Times didn’t find a way to slip the word “hulk” or even “avengers” into the Gray Lady’s latest feature on politics and the wild, wild world of Manhattan real-estate. Oh, and there is some religion news in here, somewhere.

What am I talking about?

Well, this week’s “Crossroads” podcast (click here to tune that in) focused on a story that ran with this dry, wordy, double-decker headline: “Why Mark Ruffalo and Wendell Pierce Are Fighting for a Crumbling Church — Congregants of the West Park Presbyterian Church, a Manhattan landmark, want it torn down and replaced by condos. Celebrities are joining the fight to save it.”

In the sprawling Marvel Comic universe, Ruffalo played that Big Green Guy. But you probably knew that.

Let’s work our way through this story, looking for evidence of the religion-beat story — it appears that zero religion-beat personnel were involved — that is at the heart of this story that the Times prelates see as a conflict about money, politics and, maybe, culture. Religion? Not so much.

In the podcast, I also noted that versions of this story are unfolding in urban areas around America, linked to the catastrophic decline of America’s mainline Protestant and the more Americanized versions of Roman Catholic life. What happens to their strategically located and very valuable urban sanctuaries?

The overture, which builds up to the sermon-esque thesis statement:

For years, a conflict over whether to tear down one of New York City’s historic churches, a 19th-century Romanesque Revival building on the Upper West Side, has been cast in epic terms, as a battle between the little people and big business.

In this case, however, those who see themselves as representing the little people include a growing list of New York celebrities.

And big business? That would be a real estate firm working with the tiny congregation of the West Park Presbyterian Church, which says it cannot afford to fix up the deteriorating building and hopes to sell it to a developer to build new luxury apartments on the site.


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Plug-In: What do we know about the faith of the two latest GOP White House candidates?

Plug-In: What do we know about the faith of the two latest GOP White House candidates?

A week has passed since influential pastor and author Tim Keller’s death. Look for some of the best tributes to him below.

Making news today: Texas’ GOP-controlled House could impeach scandal-ridden Republican Attorney General Ken Paxton and kick the longtime Christian right culture warrior out of office, The Associated Press’ Jake Bleiberg and Jim Vertuno report.

Jumping into this week’s roundup of the top headlines and best reads in the world of faith, we start with two new entrants in the 2024 presidential race.

What To Know: The Big Story

Political opposites: “One has the most winning personality in politics,” the Wall Street Journal’s Peggy Noonan says of South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott.

“The other doesn’t but has a story to tell about policy,” Noonan says of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis.

Thusly, the Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist and speechwriter for former President Ronald Reagan characterizes the two aspirants who declared for the GOP nomination this past week.

Scott focuses on faith: “A cornerstone of Republican Tim Scott's political career has been an unyielding faith,” USA Today’s Phillip M. Bailey notes.

Monday’s campaign kickoff by Scott, one of the nation’s most prominent Black Republicans, emphasized his Christian faith and personal story, according to the Washington Post’s Marianne LeVine.

At Politico, Natalie Allison asks, “Can Tim Scott actually win with piles of money, lots of faith and a big bet on Iowa?”


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Redeemer Presbyterian's Tim Keller: An outsider who came to New York City -- to stay

Redeemer Presbyterian's Tim Keller: An outsider who came to New York City -- to stay

On the Sunday after 9/11, thousands of New Yorkers went to church, with many joining a line stretching outside the Redeemer Presbyterian services in a Hunter College auditorium.

The Rev. Tim Keller asked his staff if they could manage a second service -- doubling the day's attendance to 5,300. Keller's sermon, "Truth, Tears, Anger and Grace," began with Jesus weeping before raising Lazarus from the dead.

Many Americans were "coming to New York to fix things," he noted. "We are glad for them. They will try to fix the buildings. We need that. And eventually they will leave. But when Jesus weeps, we see that he doesn't believe that the ministry of truth -- telling people how they should believe and turn to God -- or the ministry of fixing things is enough, does he? He also is a proponent of the ministry of tears. The ministry of truth and power without tears isn't Jesus."

This sermon contained major themes from the life and work of Keller, who died on May 19 death at age 72, after a three-year battle with Pancreatic cancer. Instead of seeking quick fixes, especially through politics, he kept urging conservative Protestants to stress compassion and face-to-face ministry, while continuing to defend centuries of Christian doctrine.

In Keller's case, that meant building a church for New Yorkers that addressed their blunt, exhausting, even cynical, concerns about life.

In that first sermon after 9/11, Keller noted that everyone had an opinion about New York City and America as a whole. Some were claiming that "God is punishing us" because of rampant immorality. Others said America had been judged because of social injustice and greed. Instead of blaming the victims, Keller said it was time to ask who would stand their ground and love their neighbors.


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Tim Keller sought 'winsome' Manhattan apologetics, a goal that became more difficult

Tim Keller sought 'winsome' Manhattan apologetics, a goal that became more difficult

If one looks up the word “winsome” in a dictionary, here is a typical example of what shows up, via Merriam-Webster: “generally pleasing and engaging often because of a childlike charm and innocence.”

However, a Google search for the term “winsome,” when combined with “Tim Keller,” opens up a window into a completely different world — one closely linked to debates about the meaning of the word “evangelical” in a Donald Trump-era culture.

Frankly, I am not going to go there. What I will do is urge GetReligion readers who visit Twitter to follow the #TimKeller hashtag and check out the waves of tributes in the wake of the passing of one of the most important American evangelicals — defined in terms of doctrine — in recent decades.

Instead of looking at the tsunami of news coverage, I will simply note the obvious — Keller is receiving much, or even most, of this attention because he lived, worked, preached and wrote in New York City. If his career had unfolded in the Bible Belt, mainstream journalists would never have heard of him. Thus, here is the New York Times double-decker headline on its obituary (which ran quickly, but inside the print edition):

The Rev. Timothy Keller, Pioneering Manhattan Evangelist, Dies at 72

Shunning fire and brimstone, he became a best-selling author and founded Redeemer Presbyterian Church, which drew young New Yorkers.

The Gray Lady’s lede offered this:

The Rev. Timothy J. Keller, a best-selling author and theorist of Christianity who performed a modern miracle of his own — establishing a theologically orthodox church in Manhattan that attracted thousands of young professional followers — died on Friday at his home in Manhattan. He was 72.

Yes, we can talk about the accuracy of the word “evangelist” in the headline. Once again, there are mainstream journalists who believe that is simply another way to say “evangelical.” Unless I missed something, Keller was not active in holding the kinds of public events — think Billy Graham “crusades” — normally associated with public evangelism. Were there some Central Park rallies with Keller sermons and altar calls that I missed? Please let me know.

What he was, of course, was a church builder and an “apologist” for small-o orthodox Christianity, of the Reformed form,” both in preaching and in writing — in books and a host of other forms.


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