Weaving In Faith

Since faith is a key component in many Americans’ everyday lives, it deserves a more prominent place in the news than that which it currently holds. Newspapers don’t need to compile a new section or column (not that it would be a bad idea too) but reporters need to weave faith into their reporting. Bill Keller, the executive editor of The New York Times said, “I think the key is to be more alert to the role religion plays in many stories we cover, stories of politics and policy, national and local, stories of social trends and family life, stories of how we live. Good journalism entails understanding more than just the neighborhood you grew up in” (pg. 83, Mind). Religion-based reports don’t have to be so obvious as Lutherans Welcome Seven Gay Pastors. I agree with Keller and think that reporters should write about religion in the context of role it plays in stories from politics to stories about how we live. They don’t need to over cover religion but they should not ignore religion all together.

I think religion and faith is not covered to its deserved extent in America because it is a complicated subject for journalists to write about. Only one out of three of our assigned books for this class have a chapter devoted to faith. As Katia Bachko put it in her article Tongue Tied on Religion, “Reporting on religion is a difficult task, if reporters are going to take up the task of explaining beliefs to their readers and viewers, they should do it with care.”

President Obama's Cairo speech on Muslim-U.S. relations was voted the #1 religion story of the year.

We learned in class there are many questions that a journalist has to answer in order to take care when covering stories related to faith and religion. Such as, Can you insert general values into news stories? This question was tested in the clip that Professor Campbell showed in class of a BYU alumni that used a quote from a prophet regarding the importance of success in the family unit.

I didn’t feel that he was attempting to insert a value into his news story with the quote but that he was just trying to portray the way a man lived his life. My perception changed however, when I saw his status update on Facebook, in which he rejoiced in his use of a quote by David O. McKay on air. This made me feel that this reporter was indeed inserting a value (one that he delights in) into his news story. Now the big question is, “Is this ok?” I think it would have been alright if he would have introduced the so-called saying with “There is a quote I really like that declares…” Without such an introduction his use of the quote is commentary parading as reporting.