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I’m not sure this is quite the direction I want to see religion coverage veer in mainstream media, but I have to admit that I enjoyed The Dallas Morning News’ “Take our ‘Faith of the Famous’ quiz” feature this weekend. I also learned a few things and, I have to admit, this funny little celebrity feature does show how wacky the modern religious marketplace has become in what I call the age of Oprah America.
Remember that pre-Easter slate of stories attempting to debunk Christianity? There was the shocking lost “Gospel of Judas” story. The Jesus walked on an ice floe (not water) that forms once every few millennia story. The Jesus’ father was a Roman soldier named Pantera story and the Jesus didn’t die on the cross so much as pass out after being doped up story.
A day before the David Kuo book leaked onto the airwaves, conservative commentator Tucker Carlson said on The Chris Matthews Show that “the elites in the Republican Party have pure contempt for the evangelicals who put their party in power.” Republicans were pandering to the values vote by bringing up gay marriage, all the while holding contempt for evangelicals, Carlson said. Was this a faint rumble or was this old news to those closely covering Bush’s faith-based initiative?
Attention all religion reporters, copy-desk chiefs or interested laypeople who are having trouble keeping up with all of the moves on the chessboard of Anglicanism in America.
Daniel Burke, Peter Sachs and editor Kevin Eckstrom of Religion News Service put out an edgy pre-election feature package on Thursday focusing on one of this blog’s favorite topics — the religious left. The headline even referenced this blog (at least, I like to think so) by saying, “With the Help of a Dozen, Democrats Learn to ‘Get Religion.’”
We have had some lively discussion in the past week on my recent post raising questions about how mainstream reporters should handle, or try to avoid, questions about Mormon doctrines that strike many traditional Christians as wrong or, at the very least, worthy of debate. The spark for the discussions, of course, is a possible Mitt Romney bid for the White House. Click here for a recent Salt Lake Tribune piece linked to this.
Molly Moore, who writes about France for The Washington Post, filed a report on French fertility. It is an anecdote-driven, uncritical look at French regulations’ effect on working mothers. It’s a bit light on data for being so heavy on conjecture, but here’s the nut:
I realize that I am tiptoeing around the edge of the blogosphere rumor mill, but I want to comment on the much-discussed Los Angeles Times piece by Johanna Neuman about those terrible Religious Right people seeking a “Pink Purge” of gay staff members in strategic Republican offices.
