Get Religion is a national and global journalism site focusing on how the mainstream press covers religion news in politics, entertainment, business and sports.
As the media fallout continues from the Vatican’s decision to rein in the Leadership Conference of Women Religious (see the full document here), I have been especially interested in the degree to which journalists are certain that this action was rooted in tensions caused by recent debates over health care, abortion and homosexuality.
In the latest print issue of the conservative Christian magazine World (which arrived in my mailbox a few days ago), editor-in-chief Marvin Olasky makes the case that The Associated Press is “desperately seeking Pulitzers” and relaxing its news standards in a way that will result in “more bias.”
As you may have heard, Charles Colson is in poor health and facing death. Here’s how Yahoo wrote it up:
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton called upon Iran last week not to proceed with its nuclear weapons program, warning that deployment of atomic weapons by Teheran would destabilize the Middle East, a story prepared by AFP reported.
One of the things I love about being a media critic is watching how a story develops over time. You may remember that years ago the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith launched a review of U.S. women religious communities. Several years ago, then, and before the the Leadership Conference of Women Religious was involved in helping President Obama pass his health care legislation, we were looking at discussions about the health of these religious orders. I remember tmatt’s column that included one such discussion:
In the Pacific Northwest, some Roman Catholic churches in the Seattle area have declined to circulate a petition calling for a referendum on Washington state’s new same-sex marriage law.
In many ways, I’m pleased by the way that religion journalism has improved over the years, even with large cuts in newsrooms and other pressures. But if there’s one example of how religion journalism has not improved — indeed, gotten worse — it would have to be the way that the Roman Catholic WomenPriests stories are covered.
Who says the Germans don’t do comedy well? An article in a recent issue of Die Welt — “Koran-Offensive alarmiert Deutschlands Parteien” shows this not to be so. As I read the article, which tip-toes round the issue of radical Islam in Germany, my mind harkened back to an episode of the television series Seinfeld.
