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Infuse media12/27/2023 It is God’s own story that should be the subject and lens, exactly as it was when journalism first got going, at the dawn of the print revolution. Religion should not be a subject at all, except perhaps in the marginal denominational press. If the media are to know how to prioritise news and shape stories, journalists must view the world through a whole different lens. What is needed is something much deeper – and this the survey has not addressed it and probably cannot. Journalism was born out of Catholic protest against bad religion. But what journalist and academic Marvin Olasky calls the “oppression narrative” has become wildly unbalanced, as if to become a priest is a very licence to molest. The work of journalists to uncover paedophilia in the US Catholic Church has been rightly celebrated in the film Spotlight. Yes, you can cover Vatican affairs, or the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation, because organised religion is inherently dangerous, and journalism should be society’s watchman. It is not a pastime to be reported on or not. To treat it in this way – even to call what we’re talking about ‘religion’ – is a secularist fallacy. The more important problem is that the survey itself seems to regard religion like any other object or activity, such as sport, finance or the environment. But to dismiss it entirely, just because it was commissioned by a burgeoning sect whose founder practised polygamy and was jailed for “riot and assembly” before being assassinated, would be wrong. Even HarrisX did not mention the survey on their own Twitter feed. The media will have smelt a rat, as I did, and refused to be drawn. The FAMI website carries a video with a heavy emphasis on “spirituality” and a voice-over that is subtly disparaging of mainline Christianity. It turns out that FAMI is an outfit based in Salt Lake City, Utah and set up by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints – or Mormons as they used to be called. The story is surely about whether surveys like this one, and the motives behind them, are sound. Yet, is that the end of the story? It shouldn’t be. Clearly if journalists don’t write about religion, they’re not going to report this. Remembering Her Majesty: 15 Christian leaders pay tributeĪ global study – apparently “the world’s biggest” - has found that journalists are ignoring religion, and that the punters want more of it.Ī US organisation called Faith and Media Initiative (FAMI) commissioned marketing firm HarrisX to survey 9,000 people in 18 different countries on “the portrayal of faith and religion in the media”.Ī cursory google indicates that no one has picked up the story, except the helpful UK-based Religion Media Centre.Why the Queen was Britain’s best evangelist.
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