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Many years ago I wrote an angry letter to the editor of Rolling Stone, doubting whether that magazine ever would give serious attention to religion and believers. I am glad that, as a contributing editor for both Rolling Stone and Harper’s, Jeff Sharlet has proven me wrong.
Churches have leased space in their bell towers to cell-phone companies for several years now, but the Chicago Tribune reports on a new twist in that discussion: whether such towers would transmit pornographic signals:
Kim Lawton is managing editor and correspondent for Religion & Ethics NewsWeekly on PBS, where she has worked since 1997. She began her career as a religion writer by covering the fall of PTL’s Jim Bakker in the late 1980s. She has written for United Press International, Religion News Service, News Network International, Christianity Today and International Media Service.
Both Time and Ken Auletta of The New Yorker devote considerable attention to Rupert Murdoch this week, as Murdoch tries to close in on purchasing The Wall Street Journal for $5 billion.
Time‘s Nancy Gibbs praised John F. Kennedy in mid-May as the model of how Mitt Romney should respond to potential voters who have theological misgivings about his quest for the presidency.
As a Salon Premium subscriber, I recently signed on for a free 12-month subscription to Reason. I had seen the magazine on occasion in public libraries, and the subscription has been rewarding enough that I’m likely to become a paying subscriber once the free year has expired.
There’s something vertigo-inducing about Bono’s editing an issue on Africa for Vanity Fair. The visual conflicts abound: Alongside Bono’s Guest Editor’s Letter about how many African children die from preventable diseases, a nude threesome promotes a Dolce & Gabbana purse; at the end of an editorial spread about 20 innovative covers shot by Annie Leibovitz, Dolce & Gabbana returns, using a piece of beefcake in a thong to promote a cologne. This is like reading an article in Playboy that condemns female genital mutilation.
I am a fool for love stories and for weddings — not enough to subscribe to Modern Bride, but enough to buy the People Extra devoted to weddings. (“Inspiring True Love Stories!” “Dogs in the Ceremony!” “Wild Theme Weddings!”) I came away from this issue of People about as saddened as I would be by a loud reception filled with people doing the White People’s Overbite.
