Detroit paper ducks Bible when female Baptist bishop quits
I haven’t been around that many Baptists of late, but one of the first things that struck me in The Detroit Free Press story about Bishop Allyson Nelson Abrams and her departure from the pastorate of...
View ArticleLATimes skips obvious ‘ghost’ in pet cemetery story
Losing a pet is often — if not always — a sad and traumatic experience. Over the past 20 years, my wife and I have shared out home with a total of five cats, three of whom have passed away, the most...
View ArticleThe Merc is shocked, shocked, by Santa Clara U move
There’s nothing the mainstream press likes more than a controversy, even if it has to puff a protest to do so. In early October, Santa Clara University, in the heart of Silicon Valley, decided it would...
View ArticleMainline killed the local church star — paper blinks
The death of a congregation is never pleasant, and the closure of the West Side Presbyterian Church in Englewood, New Jersey was no exception. Sunday, Nov. 3, was to see a final worship service at the...
View ArticleCNN goes long to say little about clergy and Obamacare
In Ecclesiastes 12:12b, we read: “Of making many books there is no end, and much study wearies the body.” Alas, the same might be said for this story from CNN’s Belief Blog, which spends an eye-popping...
View ArticleNYTimes: Just WHO you callin’ a ‘conservative’ Catholic?
Sometimes I wonder if the leaders of The New York Times,among other media titans, take the late Justice Potter Stewart approach to obscentiy when deciding who is a “conservative” Roman Catholic. The...
View ArticleNYTimes frames snake handler issue — correctly!
Even though The New York Times is the newspaper I sometimes “love to hate” for its often-casual approach to religion news, there are occasions when the “Gray Lady,” as the paper is historically known,...
View ArticleDeja vu: NYTimes Slams Catholics For Being Catholic
It numbers a recent U.S. Postmaster General (John Potter), and a current associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States (Sonia Sotomayor) as alumni, but that’s not why Cardinal Spellman...
View ArticleNYTimes: Mouseketeer-turned-Pagan-turned-Christian trip
One of the staples of evangelical Christianity — at least so far as I can remember — is the story of the spectacular sinner who found redemption, preferably on the “sawdust trail” of a tent...
View ArticleReuters skips a key detail in Israel’s wedding wars — divorce
Everybody loves a wedding, or so culture would have us believe. However, according to a report from the Reuters news agency, not every Israeli likes the wedding options available in that country: For...
View ArticleAP’s not-too-religious airport chaplain story
The entire long Thanksgiving weekend, it’s widely reported, is the busiest air-travel season in the United States. So, it’s not too difficult to imagine human interest stories about life in and around...
View ArticleNYTimes: Catholics acting Catholic, equals ACLU suit
In a startling development, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (headquarters in photo) is being sued for — you’ll never believe this! — enforcing Roman Catholic teaching in Roman Catholic...
View ArticleWSJ gets the tone right on Holocaust survivor story
There’s so much bad reporting about religion and religion-related stories these days — the continual surprise evidenced by The New York Times that the leaders of Roman Catholic institutions may choose...
View ArticleThat mainstream press anti-Catholic ‘Philomena’ pileup
In the “now I’ve seen everything” category, let’s welcome self-described atheist film critic Kyle Smith of the New York Post, now excoriated for defending the Roman Catholic Church, specifically its...
View ArticleNYTimes on Ukraine ‘ghost’: Great minds like a think?
Cause-and-effect is difficult to prove sometimes, but it is curious how things follow in a sequence of events. The recent round of protests in the Ukraine, particularly in the capital city of Kiev,...
View ArticleNYTimes: ‘On Religion’ columnist commits … journalism!
Yes, that headline is written with tongue somewhat in cheek: The New York Times‘ “On Religion” column, authored in alternate weeks by Samuel G. Freedman and Mark Oppenheimer, both academics, is at...
View ArticleAP discerns what Vatican knew in Maciel scandal
While it’s certainly the function of a reporter to puzzle out the essence of a story based on the available evidence, there are occasions when journalists choose to act as if they have nearly...
View ArticleUK’s Telegraph finds atheists in Florida — film at 11
Here’s a shocker: America is becoming more secular, atheism is on the rise and — get this! — for now there are more observant Muslims than Jews in Florida. Of course, it depends on whether you define a...
View ArticleScouts pledge ‘duty to God;’ reporter draws a blank
The highly contentious issue of the Boy Scouts of America and gay scouts became a religion story because so many Scout troops and Cub Scout packs are sponsored by churches, synagogues and other houses...
View ArticleAP skirts key element of ‘tips for Jesus’ story
As anyone who’s done it can testify — or, to be candid, so I’ve heard — waitering is a tough job. People are rude, hours are long, and wages are often sub-sub-minimum wage, all in the hope of getting...
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