, , , , ,

It's a mystery: Kicking a cardinal -- Guardian-style

, , , , ,

Who is the target in this story from The Guardian on the gay marriage vote in the Northern Ireland Legislative Assembly? Better still, who should be the target? Why is the paper favored by the Nomenklatura in Britain hammering Cardinal Sean Brady? The article from the newspaper’s Ireland correspondent reports the news that the Unionist parties (Protestants) in the Assembly will block a motion introduced by Sinn Féin to permit gay marriage. The Catholic hierarchy in Northern Ireland has also called for the bill to be blocked.

The Church of Ireland (the Anglicans) were on record as opposed to the change — however this last bit of news is not stated outright. We can infer the Anglicans were opposed by statements reported in the closing paragraphs. The article reports that Anglican gay activists were disappointed with their church’s stance.” (Here is their statement.)

If it is the Protestants, who as a group, are blocking gay marriage, why then is The Guardian beating up on the Catholic Church? Or are they beating up on one particular Catholic?


Please respect our Commenting Policy
, , , , ,

Sensitive Boston Globe feature looks at caregivers' work with the dying

, , , , ,

Thank God, literally, that not all religion news stories are about terrorists or same-sex marriage or separation of church and state. They don’t all even snark at fundamentalism. Some stories just try to help us understand. And feel.

Stories like a Boston Globe feature on clergy who care for the dying.

Written by a Globe correspondent rather than a staff writer, the story is an old-fashioned feature. It asks spiritual caregivers who and what they encounter — types of people, their thoughts and feelings and challenges — and how the caregivers cope.


Please respect our Commenting Policy
, , , ,

Newspaper reporter critiqued by GetReligion fires back

, , , ,

.@TipsForJesus still leaves $$$, so for #Easter, we asked ethicists – is it moral? http://t.co/Nmvb0cyEoF pic.twitter.com/nhAZPrBsF2 — Megan Finnerty (@MeganMFinnerty) April 17, 2014

Megan Finnerty, a Page 1 reporter for the Arizona Republic, didn’t really fire back at my recent negative review of her pre-Easter story on “Tips for Jesus.”

In fact, the thoughtful email that she sent me with the subject line “Read your critique of my story” was kinder than my snarky critique, titled “What would Jesus tip? Be sure to ask … secular ethicists!?”


Please respect our Commenting Policy
, , , ,

It's not hard! Washington Post offers some crucial Boko Haram facts

, , , ,

In the past month or two, I have been really, really hard on the editors at The New York Times because of their mysterious — that word is carefully chosen — blind spot when it comes to basic, on-the-record facts about the beliefs, motives and tactics of the radical Islamist network Boko (“books”) Haram (“forbidden”) in Nigeria. Rather than hit you with a wave of URLs, just click here for an earlier wrap-up of some of the basics. And here is a now-classic quote that offers an example of what’s happening in one of the world’s most influential newsrooms:

Boko Haram’s exact goals, beyond a generalized desire to undermine the secular Nigerian state, remain mysterious. Spokesmen purporting to be from the group sometimes release rambling videos, but these offer few clues of a coherent program or philosophy.

In previous posts, I praised a BBC background piece that nailed down many of the essential facts. You know, like the fact that the ultra-violent network’s official name is Jama’atu Ahlis Sunna Lidda’awati wal-Jihad, which in Arabic means “People Committed to the Propagation of the Prophet’s Teachings and Jihad” and the unofficial name, Boko Haram, is usually translated as “Western education is forbidden.” A crucial fact is that, in addition to slaughtering Christians and other minorities, Boko Haram specializes in killing Muslims who cooperate with the West, especially in the education of women and children.


Please respect our Commenting Policy
, , , , , ,

That 'throuple' rite: Who led them through their vows?

, , , , , ,

First, let me assure regular GetReligion readers that I am not writing this post out of the desire to be able to put the trendy word “throuple” in a digital headline. And, besides, the wits at The New York Daily News had already put the rather obvious “Three women and a baby!” in their lede. No there were some real, live religious questions that nagged at me after seeing several news references to the polygamous relationship between Brynn, Doll and Kitten Young, a trio of either lesbian or bisexual women (the personal histories are complex) who are testing the limits of legal relationships in the always edgy state of Massachusetts. Here is a key section of the story, which points back to its origins in the splashy pages of British newspapers:

Doll, 30, and Brynn, 32, had been together for 2-and-a-half years when they decided to spice up their relationship with an additional partner.

Smitten after meeting Kitten, 27, through a threesomes’ website, they decided to tie the knot to each other last August. And, after undergoing IVF with an unknown sperm donor, the youngest of the group is now with child.


Please respect our Commenting Policy
, , , , , ,

African simony assertions from Religion News Service

, , , , , ,

As a good Protestant (in an Anglican context, of course), I reject the doctrine of purgatory — that intermediate state after death where those destined for paradise “undergo purification, so as to achieve the holiness necessary to enter the joy of heaven.” I am not as courageous, however, as the author of a recent piece in The Federalist. Denoucing the cult of saints as un-Scriptural and un-Christian on the day before Pope John Paul II and Pope John XXIII were celebrated as saints by the Vatican was a turn worthy of Ian Paisley in his prime. But I digress.

I am, nevertheless, tempted by the doctrine of purgatory for I have just spent 24 hours at the Atlanta airport — the intermediate state for all travelers destined for the paradise of Florida.

Sanity was preserved, however, through application to my writing coupled with meditations on the devotional book I had packed for the journey: P.G. Wodehouse’s Leave it to Psmith (1924). Bashar al-Assad, Vladimir Putin, Pope Francis and Archbishop Welby joined the Earl of Emsworth, Psmith and the dastardly Rupert Baxter as companions on my journey.


Please respect our Commenting Policy
, , , ,

Did the Washington Post offer reporting or cheerleading?

, , , ,

The religious left gets sympathetic treatment, not only from a new report by the Brookings Institution, but by a Washington Post article on it. The story uncritically quotes the report, though it also offers some background on the Old Left, including its religious wing. And it doesn’t ask for reactions from anyone on the right, or even the moderate middle.

Instead, the article starts out by choosing the good guys:

The religious left was never as cohesive and effective as the religious right. But a new report based on interviews with religious progressive leaders finds that the Obama era may have further weakened Democrats’ interest in the non-secular.


Please respect our Commenting Policy
, , ,

Journalism, religion and a botched execution in Oklahoma

, , ,

Years ago, when I covered the state prison system for The Oklahoman and began serving as an official media witness for executions, those were the kinds of questions friends asked. I mean, I knew I had watched someone die. But I did so in a controlled, sanitized environment. A needle was inserted into a convicted killer’s arm — like someone receiving anesthesia for surgery — and the person lost consciousness. Within a few minutes, a time of death was declared.

The process was so routine, in most cases, that I wrote a behind-the-scenes account in 2000 of a “typical” execution day in Oklahoma:

McALESTER — At 6 a.m., before the sun has time to scale the towering white walls of the Oklahoma State Penitentiary, Roger James Berget opens his eyes.


Please respect our Commenting Policy
, , , , , , , , ,

The Los Angeles Times offers readers a simple, one-sided take on Vatican

, , , , , , , , ,

Every niche website has a few “big ideas” that drive its work day after day. Any GetReligion reader knows — duh — that one of our big ideas is that the press often doesn’t see crucial religious themes and facts that are at the heart of important news stories. That’s the whole “ghost” concept that is explained in the essay published when we opened for business. If you never stopped to read that one, please do. Another crucial concept for your GetReligionistas is that we are convinced that the “hotter” the story, the more a topic causes public division and debate, the more journalists should commit themselves to seeking out informed, qualified, representative voices on both sides. Of course, there are two sides or more, in many complex stories. This concept is central to what journalism textbooks would call the “American model of the press,” as opposed to the various forms of advocacy journalism in which the editors of publications openly slant their coverage to favor the editorial viewpoint that defines their newspaper.

That’s why it was so important when Bill Keller, days after he stepped down as New York Times editor, said the following in a public forum when he was asked if his newspaper slanted the news to the left:

“We are liberal in the sense that we are open-minded, sort of tolerant, urban. Our wedding page includes — and did even before New York had a gay marriage law — included gay unions. So we’re liberal in that sense of the word, I guess. Socially liberal.”


Please respect our Commenting Policy