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"The press . . . just doesn't get religion." -- William Schneider

Ghosts in Lee’s green manifesto?Yesterday

5Q+1: Bruce Nolan, five years after KatrinaYesterday

Whenever I see Bruce Nolan’s byline, I think of Bruce Almighty, thanks to a post Bobby wrote back in June. On screen, Jim Carrey’s character Bruce Nolan acts as a television reporter who plays God for a bit.

In all seriousness, though, the real journalist Bruce Nolan has done some solid stories down at the The Times-Picayune in New Orleans. In case you didn’t hear, there was this thing called Hurricane Katrina, and then another thing called an oil spill.

Nolan’s job has been to dig out religion angles out of what initially seemed to be a natural disaster story and a corporate blunder story. Here’s a sample: Katrina anniversary services as a litmus for the emotional status of the region, collective prayer as a response to the oil spill, seeing the spill theologically as a “sin” against creation, a Jewish social justice training pr

Got News? What’s a moderate Muslim?Yesterday

We’ve seen quite a bit of coverage of the Cordoba mosque project near ground zero. Most in-depth questioning or investigative journalism seems focused on opponents of the mosque project. Most discussions of the backers of the project assert that they are “moderate.” But what is a moderate Muslim? What does the phrase “moderate” mean, much less imply? And this is putting aside the fact that there’s plenty of information out there about Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf that makes one wonder what the modifier “moderate” means in his case any way.

I really enjoyed this Wall Street Journal editorial page symposium that decided to ask the question “

Complex laws in Afghan stoning ageSeptember 1

Excuse me if I head deep into the tmatt guilt folder and make a point or two about a story that I’ve been mulling over for more than a week.

Your GetReligionistas frequently criticize the mainstream press for its simplistic coverage of issues linked to Islamic tradition, doctrine and law. The problem, of course, is that journalists keep writing as if there is only one approach to Islam. Journalists say, “Islam teaches this” and “Islam teaches that” without pausing to admit that, repeat after me, “There is no one Islam.”

This amazes me because journalists frequently write about “moderate” Muslims and (excuse me for typing the following words) “fundamentalist” Muslims, yet rarely offer any practical details that tell us the beliefs that define the lives of people in these camps.

Well, in this case I want to compliment a recent story in the Los Angeles Times, sort of, for a story in which the newspaper did a fabulous job showing the complexity of recent events in Afghanistan that pivot on clashing approaches to Sharia law. At the same time, let me note that the reporter and editors that produced this

Strippers in the pews — er, newsSeptember 1