Sarah Pulliam Bailey

Angry Birds app v. meditation app

Some newspapers become obsessed with localizing just for the sake of localizing. Editors will look at something that happened in India and then get their reporters to find local Indian-Americans to comment on the issue. I know first-hand because I have been asked to do these stories in the past.


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Religion coverage doubles ... to 2 percent

Exciting news from the Pew Research Center today: religion coverage doubled from 2009 to 2010 in the mainstream media. Unfortunately, religion still remains just 2 percent of the overall coverage, with elections, foreign policy and the economy dominating the news cycle. Still, it did barely top science, education, immigration and race/gender issues.


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A conscientious discharge

A Naval Academy graduate received an honorable discharge last week after two earlier denials from the Navy. The American Civil Liberties Union in Connecticut had sued the Navy on the graduate’s behalf, based on his religious objection to war and the potential that he might have to kill others.


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Religiously reproduce?

Coming from a family of eight, my interest is often piqued when I come across stories about large families. If we had cable, we might be 19 Kids and Counting regulars. But 19 children seems small in comparison to this family in India. Get ready for this story from Reuters.


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Let's copulate?

Publications often set up “experts” to write definitive pieces on certain subjects without asking them to follow some basic journalism standards, such as providing evidence for conclusions. We see this kind of piece from historian Jessica Warner the Globe & Mail on how evangelicals are getting quite sexy.


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Pod people: The tea party + Scientology

I’ve been wondering whether the tea party has somewhat replaced religious conservatives in some of the 2012 presidential election coverage, but maybe it’s too soon to tell. After all, if someone like former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney or former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee gets the nomination, we probably will see quite a bit of religion coverage.


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Scientology's apostates

So 25,000 words on religion — from The New Yorker–makes me pretty giddy. OK, it’s about Scientology, which continues to keep journalists fascinated for its celebrity draw and secrecy. But hopefully this kind of piece shows how religion can make really compelling journalism. You’ll find a little bit of everything in this piece: celebrities, money, abuse, family, sex, power, etc. Religion often touches all of that and more.


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