Kellerism

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Zero objectivity: Seattle Times report on Franklin Graham-backed police dinner hits new low

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Seattle is in trouble.

People don't feel safe taking their kids into downtown Seattle, even the public parks (they support through taxes). The place is dirty. Mentally ill people wander about. Drug use and crime and widespread. And in the middle of it all are the demoralized Seattle police, who saw one of their precinct stations closed by rioters for three weeks last summer during the infamous CHOP occupation.

So, you’d think that an event honoring these same police would get some good press.

Not so fast. According to the Seattle Times:

The invitation to a free dinner at a four-star hotel in Bellevue starts out by thanking law enforcement officers for their bravery and service and goes on to promise an uplifting message, fellowship and practical wisdom from God’s word.

That invitation showed up in the inboxes of Seattle Police Department employees on Wednesday, according to a copy of the department wide email obtained by The Seattle Times. On Friday, police Chief Adrian Diaz revoked the email invitation because the dinner, billed as a law-enforcement appreciation event, is reportedly hosted by the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association. The invitation was signed by the association’s CEO, Franklin Graham, a conservative, second-generation Christian televangelist who has a history of opposing LGBTQ rights.

Some of you may remember that Graham got negative press treatment this time a year ago for setting up a tent in Central Park that had the temerity to treat COVID-19 patients. Largely ignored was the fact that a local health organization, Mount Sinai Health System, contracted with Graham to set up the tent. Most reports in the local media made it sound like it was as if Adolf Hitler had set up shop.

Despite his organization’s policy that only the caregivers, not the recipients of care, affirm centuries of Christian doctrine that marriage is only between a man and a woman, Graham was demonized as an anti-gay bigot. He couldn’t win; if he didn’t help out, he was neglecting the masses; if he did, he was imposing his beliefs on others.

I am curious if the Seattle Times reporter read this New York Times interview with Graham that said that New York City’s Commission on Human Rights found no evidence that Graham had discriminated against patients and included a link from the editor of a Jewish publication slamming local politicians for their own bigotry.

Now we’re moving the media-bias battle to Seattle. Back to the Times:

The email to SPD employees was sent by the department’s Wellness Unit after being approved by the unit’s lieutenant, according to the original email.

Diaz sent his own department-wide email just after 4:30 p.m. Friday and a message was posted on the department’s online blotter, stating that based on “Graham’s history and affiliations,” concerns had been raised that SPD does not fully support the community’s LGBTQ members.

The article then runs through the usual PR comments by various police officials, a withering quote by Seattle City Council President M. Lorena González (thanks to the council’s defund-the-police actions, a record number of 144 officers have left in the past year), an angry police officer (no doubt the source for the email being forwarded to the Times), an openly gay police officer and so on.

As someone who lives in the Seattle suburbs, the hypocrisy of it all stuns me. Here’s a city that’s overrun with homeless, whose tents are smack in the middle of major tourist attractions (like the city’s gorgeous waterfront), plus crime is surging and even Amazon is decamping for neighboring Bellevue and the media-friendly culture warriors are upset about this?

The police officers are telling local TV stations they are refusing to work for “this socialist city council” and when an outside organization tries to hold an appreciation dinner for the stoic officers who remain, the best the Seattle Times can do is a one-sided report?

Contrasted to the five sources that trashed Graham and his organization, the Times ran no balancing quotes from any local leaders who would offer an opposing point of view.

A sentence saying that Graham’s group didn’t answer an email sent the day before doesn’t cut it. The sponsoring Billy Graham Evangelistic Association is based in Charlotte, N.C., which is three time zones ahead of Seattle. The chances are good that the email arrived too late for anyone in charge to take a look.

Plus, when the reporter can’t find a quote from a prime source, she’s supposed to look for one from a secondary source. Evangelical organizations and churches do exist in Seattle and I can’t believe she couldn’t find a pastor in one of them who could have offered some kind of defense for Graham. Sadly, the Times did away with its religion beat years ago, so apparently the newsroom has no one with the local religious contacts.

Hint: There are plenty of evangelical organizations in town: (World Relief, Union Gospel Mission, Seattle Pacific University, Northwest University for starters) who’ve got talking heads. Start cultivating them.

To get right to the point: The Fellowship of Christian Peace Officers has a Seattle affiliate. I found a contact name and phone number in less than 30 seconds.

Plus, Graham himself recorded a video several months ago explaining why he wants to do these police appreciation dinners in places like Seattle, Portland and Kenosha, Wisc. Surely, a quote could have been lifted from that.

But no. Here we see “Kellerism,” a term created by a GetReligion reader after former New York Times editor Bill Keller implied in a speech there’s no need for balance or fairness when the reporting is about morality, culture, religion, etc. You can read the Keller quotes for yourself right here.

To find the other side of the story, I didn’t need to look much harder than this column by KTTH Radio show host Jason Rantz, who said that Gonzalez’ anti-cop views were at the base of it all. He said in part:

Gonzalez frames her concern over LGBTQ issues, calling out Graham’s religious views as anti-gay. But her concerns are contrived. This is about getting in the way of supporting police officers. In the process, she wins some plaudits from anti-police activists upset she hasn’t done enough to abolish the police.

The event is free for law enforcement officers. It offers appreciation for the work law enforcement does in a city where the Council and a loud activist community turn cop-hating into a sport. It’s also religious in nature, as the invite promises an “uplifting message, encouraging and practical wisdom from God’s Word, live music, and fellowship with other law enforcement officers.”

But because of its religious nature, and Graham’s religious objection to gay marriage, Gonzalez feigned outrage.

Now what the Times and the above column did add is that the event was sponsored by the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, not by Franklin Graham’s organization Samaritan’s Purse. Yes, the younger Graham signed the invite, but that was his only involvement. But folks out here in western Washington are going to punish him if that’s the last thing they do. The dinner will occur in mid-May and The Stranger, a local lefty site, is encouraging folks to bring their cameras and take photos of whichever police officers decide to attend.

But hey, doxxing is OK when the group is related to Franklin Graham.

I get that journalists can’t help the craziness that reigns in the Emerald City at present. But when it comes to reporting on something like this, at least try — try to include an opposing point of view. Show some respect for people on both sides of public debates. It’s called “journalism.”

I know it’s a stretch. But it can be done. Trust me.


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What can modern people (journalists even) know about biblical figures like Joshua?

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What can modern people (journalists even) know about biblical figures like Joshua?

THE QUESTION (as raised by The New York Times):

What can we know about biblical figures, for instance Joshua?

THE ANSWER:

How do we know what we know, or think we know, or can know, or might know?

“Epistemology” is the branch of philosophy that ponders such matters. It may seem odd, but philosophers even ponder if there’s any basis for believing that anything we remember from before one second ago actually happened!

Back to earth, how do we assess what can be known about people and events from long ago that we ourselves did not witness? One approach is the ideology known as “logical positivism,’ which rules out supernatural claims in advance by definition and thus wipes out many assertions by the great world religions. That’s a simple method, but other philosophers say it’s far too simple.

Well, then, what can we know about the past, whether religious or not? The answer is almost entirely written records that have been passed down to us. This is obviously central with the biblical faiths of Judaism and Christianity, which center heavily upon historical narratives.

Which is why The Religion Guy continues to ponder eight words The New York Times found fit to print in a recent feature about Muslims in Iraq tending what they believe is the tomb of Joshua. Israelis say instead that the ancient patriarch is buried 20 miles north of Jerusalem.

Both claimed locations invite skepticism. But the influential newspaper went much further, informing readers: “There is no historical evidence Joshua actually existed.”

This is not a particularly prudent thing to say in the Muslim world, where Joshua is revered as an actual prophet of God in the line that culminated with the Prophet Muhammad, had no doubt Joshua existed, this according to authoritative hadith texts. Joshua is also referred to in the Quran, though not by name (18:60). The earlier Jewish and Christian Scriptures depict Joshua as an actual person.

In effect, the Times writer and copy editors tell us the Jewish Bible contains nothing that should count as historical evidence. Think about that. Liberal university professors will often teach that a particular Bible section has flawed evidence, or mixes fact with myth, or even is pure fiction. But they do not dismiss all evidence that the Bible records.


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New podcast: Familiar splits among white 'evangelicals,' only now they're about vaccines

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New podcast: Familiar splits among white 'evangelicals,' only now they're about vaccines

It’s really a matter of simple math and logic.

Let’s start with this question, stripped of the political and journalism questions attached to it: Which of the following numbers is larger and, thus, more important — 45 or 55?

If you said “45,” then you’re ready to write headlines and edit controversial stories for The New York Times.

Before we move on, let’s ask another question that was at the heart of this week’s “Crossroads” podcast (click here to tune that in). I’ll frame this in as neutral a manner as possible: If members of the Democratic Party were divided 55% “yes” to 45% “no” on a major decision, would you see this (a) as a sign that Democrats were united in opposition to the question at hand or (b) that Democrats were starkly divided on the question, with a majority taking a positive stance? I should mention that the 55% “yes” vote includes virtually all of leaders of major institutions within the world of Democratic Party life.

With that in mind, let’s contemplate the story under the following double-decker headline from the Times:

White Evangelical Resistance Is Obstacle in Vaccination Effort

Millions of white evangelical adults in the U.S. do not intend to get vaccinated against Covid-19. Tenets of faith and mistrust of science play a role; so does politics.

This brings us to the crucial summary material in this story:

The opposition is rooted in a mix of religious faith and a longstanding wariness of mainstream science, and it is fueled by broader cultural distrust of institutions and gravitation to online conspiracy theories. The sheer size of the community poses a major problem for the country’s ability to recover from a pandemic that has resulted in the deaths of half a million Americans. And evangelical ideas and instincts have a way of spreading, even internationally.

There are about 41 million white evangelical adults in the U.S. About 45 percent said in late February that they would not get vaccinated against Covid-19, making them among the least likely demographic groups to do so, according to the Pew Research Center.

“If we can’t get a significant number of white evangelicals to come around on this, the pandemic is going to last much longer than it needs to,” said Jamie Aten, founder and executive director of the Humanitarian Disaster Institute at Wheaton College, an evangelical institution in Illinois.


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Obvious question: Maybe Christian faith played a role in the Scott Drew and Baylor hoops story?

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Obvious question: Maybe Christian faith played a role in the Scott Drew and Baylor hoops story?

Frankly, I am not the most enthusiastic of Baylor University alums (I once passed up a request to apply for a faculty slot by telling the president that I had already died once in Waco wasn’t anxious for a reprise).

Still, you didn’t think that the Baylor basketball team was going to win the national championship (after being a favorite in the COVID-canceled 2020 dance) without a word of comment here? I mean, I have heard from other Baylor grads who worked their way through lots of the mainstream news coverage of the March Madness finale while thinking “ghost,” “ghost,” “another religion ghost.”

Yes, this was the Texas Baptists vs. Jesuits matchup that hoops fans wanted. And then you had the simple reality that Baylor (for better and for worse) is the world’s most prominent Baptist academic institution.

But how could the press ignore or short-change the fact that the story of coach Scott Drew and his underdog Bears was packed with valid religion facts and themes? Would all fans care that Final Four MVP Jared Butler teaches a Sunday School class for little kids? Probably not. But millions of people would.

But they key to everything was this big question: Why was Drew at Baylor in the first place? Why did he pack up and head to Waco 18 years ago, when the program was dead, dead, dead or worse. Here’s the top of a long CBS Sports feature: “Scott Drew never let others change his story, path or program, and that's how he led Baylor to its first title.”

Leaping into the arms of his staff. College basketball's happiest coach on his happiest night. When it was over, Drew brought everyone into a huge circle on the court. They kneeled and said a prayer.

The greatest program reinvention in men's college basketball history was complete.

Drew took the Baylor job in 2003 when the program was near disintegration. The job Drew's done at Baylor in the 18 years since -- impressive is an understatement. There was no set of instructions when he got there, because there wasn't even a drawer to put them in. This was not a rebuild; what Baylor could be, in 2003, was a figment of Drew's imagination.

Drew is described in all kinds of upbeat, but strange, ways. This is one happy, upbeat, positive-thinking weirdo. Does it matter that, when he describes his bond with Baylor, he talks in terms of Christian faith, family and a sense that God called him to this job? Is that part of this national news story, just because Drew says so and there is tons of evidence that he means it?


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New podcast: Rising tensions between religious liberty, pronoun wars, academic freedom, etc.

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New podcast: Rising tensions between religious liberty, pronoun wars, academic freedom, etc.

My name is Terry Lee Mattingly. However, when I converted to Eastern Orthodoxy, I took the name of a patron saint — St. Brendan the Navigator.

Let’s pretend that I am young and attending a state university right now and that I have decided to require professors to address me as “Holy St. Brendan the Navigator.” It is, after all, my name. While we are at it, let’s say that all of the Catholic and Orthodox students take the same tack, if their saint names are different then the names they were given at birth.

Some professors would wince, but go along with this. But let’s say that one professor is very secular, a Marxist perhaps, and he refuses — stating that my request violates his personal convictions. I threaten to sue, along with other students in the same situation. Game on.

How would the leaders of this taxpayer-funded public university respond? Would this be treated as a natural request on my part, with the understanding that any refusal would attack my sense of identity? What if I requested that my university ID card state my name as “St. Brendan the Navigator”?

It’s a crazy question, of course. But it would — at a state university — raise issues about the First Amendment (free speech and religious liberty) and academic freedom. These questions were at the heart of this week’s “Crossroads” podcast discussion. Click here to tune that in. [This episode also includes a bizarre gaffe when — I’m wrestling with a painful medical condition right now — I messed up my own saint’s name, mixing St. Brendan’s title with that of St. Nicholas of Myra. Listen for it.]

At the heart of the podcast discussion is a timely question: Can the state force the professor to recognize and even affirm — with public speech — beliefs that violate his conscience?

Now, as readers probably guessed right from the get go, this podcast focuses on another matter of personal identity — the degree to which professors can be forced to cooperate with students who chose to use any of the myriad and evolving gender pronouns linked to the LGBTQ+ movement. We looked at a Washington Post story with this headline: “A professor was reprimanded for refusing to use a transgender student’s pronouns. A court says he can sue.”

Now, when these clashes take part in PRIVATE schools — left or right, religious or secular — it’s clear (pending passage of the Equality Act) that these doctrinally defined institutions have a right to create belief and lifestyle covenants that settle issues of this kind. Students can chose to affirm these beliefs, freely signing on the dotted line, or go to school somewhere else.

But what about state schools built and operated with tax dollars?


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Purity culture questions: A friendly, but crucial, dialogue between two evangelical thinkers

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Purity culture questions: A friendly, but crucial, dialogue between two evangelical thinkers

The purity culture wars continue over on Twitter, where a crucial question — from a journalism perspective — can be seen in the following sequence.

There is no question that some church leaders went too far with purity culture themes and rites, including hellish actions by abusive men. Can anyone deny that? However, can journalists (and their academic and activist sources) assume that because evil happened in some cases means that it happened in all cases? And, to be specific, do journalists have on-the-record evidence that the alleged shooter in Atlanta was, in fact, warped by abusive people at an abusive church?

GetReligion published two posts linked to these debates. Check out Julia Duin’s post here: “Panning purity culture: What the press doesn't get about basic Christian doctrines on sex.”

Then, I raised other basic journalism questions here: “Wait a minute: How is a sermon on the Second Coming linked to shootings in Atlanta?”

Before we get to this weekend’s two “think pieces” on this topic — by religious-liberty activist David French and Crossway books executive Justin Taylor — here is a flashback to a key passage in my post, which is linked to some of Taylor’s constructive criticism of the French piece.

It’s not enough to say that this or that conservative congregation, or counseling center, or parachurch ministry is “evangelical” and, thus, the public can assume that Christian doctrines were used in manipulative ways. …

Ponder this equation: Journalists cannot assume that a specific evangelical flock advocates dangerous doctrine X, simply because there are experts (progressive evangelicals even) who insist that all evangelicals teach dangerous doctrine X and, thus, we know that dangerous doctrine X causes broken, manipulated individuals to do hellish things.

At some point, journalists need to find specific people advocating specific ideas and actions — using research methods that are deeper than second-hand reports and the convictions of hostile experts on one side of fights about the Sexual Revolution.

This brings us to French’s must-read piece:


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New podcast: Tensions with NCAA and Christian schools? That issue will not go away

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New podcast: Tensions with NCAA and Christian schools? That issue will not go away

A decade or so ago, I had a chance to speak to journalism students at Oral Roberts University. My strongest memories — other than visions of the shiny modernist architecture — center on an unusual moment during a campus chapel service.

There’s nothing unusual about a Christian university having a full-house chapel service. There’s nothing unusual about a student-led praise-rock band blasting out Contemporary Christian Music songs that inspired lots of people to do their share of swaying and dancing.

But here’s the memory. My visit to the campus took place during a meeting of ORU’s board of trustees, who sat together near the front of the auditorium during chapel. Looking down from the balcony, I was surprised to see that (a) many of the trustees were rather young, (b) a much higher than normal number of them were Black or Latino and (c) several were enthusiastically dancing with the students, including at least one in an aisle (the current board doesn’t look quite as young).

All of this was a reminder that much of the racial and cultural diversity at ORU — a major factor in campus life — was and is linked to the school’s roots in charismatic and Pentecostal Christianity, a movement that as been highly multiracial since its birth. Founder Oral Roberts was a famous, and often controversial, leader among charismatic Christians, even though, as an adult, he aligned with the United Methodist Church (which is more conservative in Oklahoma than, let’s say, parts of Illinois and other blue zip codes).

I bring this up because of a recent USA Today “For the Win” column that served as the hook for this week’s “Crossroads” podcast (click here to tune that in). Here’s the headline for that piece, which was written by the “race and inclusion editor” at USA Today sports: “Oral Roberts University isn't the feel good March Madness story we need.” Here is a crucial passage:

… As the spotlight grows on Oral Roberts and it reaps the good will, publicity and revenue of a national title run, the university’s deeply bigoted anti-LGBTQ+ polices can’t and shouldn’t be ignored.

Founded by televangelist Oral Roberts in 1963, the Christian school upholds the values and beliefs of its fundamentalist namesake, making it not just a relic of the past, but wholly incompatible with the NCAA’s own stated values of equality and inclusion.


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Catholic journalists are must-read sources for those seeking reality of Cuomo scandals

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Catholic journalists are must-read sources for those seeking reality of Cuomo scandals

It was just two months ago, in the aftermath of the U.S. Capitol riot, that an idea was floated that could help stop all the misinformation in our society: a “reality czar.”

It was a New York Times piece by tech columnist Kevin Roose (his new book “Futureproof” is a must read if you’re interested in automation replacing you at work) on Feb. 2 that quoted experts who floated ideas to stop what the paper called the “scourge of hoaxes and lies.”

Roose’s piece threw out some interesting solutions — although “reality czar” is Orwellian, a Soviet-style solution to misinformation.

The harsh reality is that news consumers will need to read a wider variety of news sources if they are interested in finding solid facts, on-the-record sources and some sense of balanced reporting. On issues linked to religion, culture and politics, that will mean paying more attention to independent religious publications — including Catholic websites — that are now punching way above their weight. Hold that thought, because we will come back to it.

The truth is reality used to be what journalism purported to report on.

That’s no longer true given how polarized the news media has become over the past decade, a progression that sped up during the Donald Trump years and following the proliferation of partisan news sources during the internet age.

From a political standpoint, this brand of one-sided journalism has allowed politicians to earn cover from many mainstream newsrooms for alleged wrongdoings. On the left, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, embroiled in dual scandals regarding nursing home deaths during COVID-19 and growing claims of sexual harassment, is a prime example of this phenomena.

At this time last year, professionals at news organizations were fawning all over his press conferences as the country plunged into the pandemic. Many journalists considered Cuomo the coronavirus reality czar.

Why? Cuomo, a Democrat, served as the counterweight to then-President Trump.


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Wait a minute: How is a sermon on the Second Coming linked to shootings in Atlanta?

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Wait a minute: How is a sermon on the Second Coming linked to shootings in Atlanta?

The hellish shootings in Atlanta have unleashed fierce debates combining questions about sex, sin, salvation, repentance, race and various combinations of all of those hot-button topics.

The debates center, of course, of statements by Robert Aaron Long — the suspect in the killing of eight people, including six Asian women — and his complicated and troubled history as a young member of Crabapple First Baptist Church in Milton, Ga., a Southern Baptist congregation.

Eventually, court testimony will provide hard facts about this case. At this point, all the evidence is that Long was raised as a conservative Christian, was active in his church youth group and that he abandoned his faith and then, quite literally, all hell broke loose in his personal and family life. Long has said that a “sex addiction” drove him to frequent massage parlors and his family, apparently, sent him to a Christian counseling center for treatment. His conservative Christian parents “threw him out of the house” the night before the shootings, according to reports in the Washington Post and elsewhere.

Like I said, on-the-record details will emerge. Right now, I want to raise a journalism question or two about coverage of the SBC congregation that is involved in this story. What do we know about this church and, well, how do we know what we know? One Post story notes the following, quoting a solid, factual source:

The evangelical congregation’s minister, the Rev. Jerry Dockery, is an energetic preacher who advocated for a socially conservative brand of Christianity that, as the church bylaws put it, views “adultery, fornication, homosexuality, bisexual conduct, bestiality, incest, polygamy, pedophilia, pornography, or any attempt to change one’s sex, or disagreement with one’s biological sex” as “sinful and offensive to God.”

This isn’t shocking material, if you know anything about traditional forms of Christianity. It would be easy to find specific quotations from recent Catholic popes — including Pope Francis — condemning behaviors such as these, and more.

This congregation is also connected to several doctrinally conservative organizations or movements linked to SBC life, such as the Founders Ministries. All of this leads me to a specific sermon reference discussing the end of the world and Christian teachings about the second coming of Jesus Christ. Oh, and if you stop and think about it, this includes the church’s pastor — indirectly — offering a warning about Christians worshipping political leaders such as Donald Trump.

Say what?


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