Celebrity news is not a big part of what we do here, but when a story is about an actor as colorful as Mark Wahlberg, don't you want to know some of the details when the headline is as provocative as this one?
Mark Wahlberg Gets No Respect At Church
Sure, it's an entertainment news site (a young, hip GetReligion reader spotted this recent blurb and sent the link). Still, you print a story that is rooted in religion and readers may want to ask questions. So what's the deal?
Entourage has become a curse for Mark Wahlberg on Sundays -- because people approach him in church with story lines and requests to be on the hit show. Wahlberg, who is the producer of the series -- which is based on his early days in Hollywood, admits a family trip to church has become a business meeting and he'd like others to leave him alone when he's worshiping.
He says, "I go to church and people ask me if they can be on Entourage, what's gonna happen. I go to church to worship, I don't go to church to talk about it. The stuff that I did with my entourage back in the day is stuff that I'm not proud of and I'm asking forgiveness for; I don't want things brought up in church, but, if you go to church in Beverly Hills, those kind of things happen."
And his fellow worshipers don't just bug him about Entourage. He adds, "I get scripts, resumes, books -- people tried to come up to me with a children's book before and I wouldn't take it. They got upset with me. This is church."
This man has had a pretty colorful life -- in and out of the public eye. His beautiful girlfriend and their children together have ended up in the public eye quite a bit. Those nutty celebrity photographers love them.
So, OK, I will ask the obvious question: Even in an entertainment short, shouldn't it tell us where he goes to church? Don't you want to know?
Well, this is why we have search engines. The information that shows up there makes the pitched-in-church story even more interesting. Read this, from yet another entertainment biz site:
Mark Wahlberg has confirmed he and partner Rhea Durham are going to for a small, intimate wedding when they finally marry next year. The couple began dating in 2001 and have three children together -- five year old daughter Ella, two year old son Michael and newborn son Brendan -- but Mark ... revealed he only now feels ready to commit to marriage."
Where? A Catholic parish. No celebrity photographers allowed. You were expected a more liberal or progressive sanctuary?
Well, the assumption is that this is a parish in California.