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When Amy Sullivan of Time wrote one of the finest articles about President Obama’s church options, she quoted a creative idea from Flo McAfee, former religious liaison for the Clinton White House. McAfee recommended worshiping in the chapel at the Army’s Fort Meyer, where security already is covered.
Time.com has published a short, brilliant report on Iran’s tensions by an anonymous writer whom it identifies both as “a Time reporter in Tehran” and “a resident of the capital.” The basic facts of the story are simple. In an effort to keep Iranians at home, rather than marching in the streets, the besieged theocracy has turned to a 21st-century version of bread and circuses: Broadcast plenty of movies.
Dana Parsons of the Los Angeles Times does a fine job today in reporting about Robert H. Schuller’s second attempt to appoint a successor from among his grown children. This time his eldest daughter, Sheila Schuller Coleman, will be responsible to preach on occasion and keep the Schuller name at the forefront.
Reader’s Digest announced in November 2008 that it will work with evangelical pastor Rick Warren to produce a new magazine and a “Facebook for Christians” platform. In a report heavy with ideology, Stephanie Clifford of The New York Times treats the Warren deal, and a staff meeting at the corporate headquarters, as evidence that the company is turning more conservative:
When Lenny Kravitz says he has been celibate for a time, whether it’s four months or (now) four years, a measured skepticism may be in order. Reporter Chris Heath brings that skepticism, however briefly, to a 5,500-word profile of Kravitz for the Telegraph.
Kim Janssen of the Chicago Tribune did a generally solid job with a delicate topic on Friday, telling the story of a woman who blogged about having a baby with Trisomy 13, then losing the baby to death soon afterward. This pregnancy, although fictional, drew on what blogger Beccah Beushausen said was her previous loss of a baby under similar circumstances.
This week’s edition of Time features a 2,400-word essay by Robert Wright, and it’s one of the most amusing exercises in eisegesis I’ve read in a very long time. The cover of Time promotes the essay, an excerpt from Wright’s new book The Evolution of God, as cracking a code embedded in the Scriptures of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. The article’s subtitle suggests that, if the monotheistic Scriptures are read correctly (i.e., with Wright’s code in mind), this may even create the possibility of reconciliation and religious harmony.
When popular films portray Christians well — not as plaster saints or as hypocrites with bulging eyes — they can achieve a near-transcendence. I think of the late great Horton Foote’s screenplays for Tender Mercies or The Trip to Bountiful, or the the humanity that director Paul Thomas Anderson gave to a Christian police officer in Magnolia.
One certainty in coverage of George Till’s murder has been Randall Terry’s consistent reference to Tiller as a mass murderer. Terry repeated that message again Wednesday as part of a summer lecture series sponsored by The Rutherford Institute.
