Media and religion

From drums and smoke signals to the internet, "media" represent too many expressions to be contained in generalizations.

Religion?

There are many thousands listed in encyclopedias, there are 200-300 denominations in the U.S., 25,000+ Christian bodies in the world, in millions of congregations with billions of adherents.

I seem to be talking about math more than religion, but it helps make my point: that the more outlets there are, the more diversity there is, the better off we'll be. It's harder for would-be religious tyrants to prevail when there are so many kinds of images and sounds carrying religious messages.

Yet I think I know what the questioner is after. Do the major TV, radio, and print media and the entrepreneurs who counter them, compete with them, and offer alternatives, treat religious people and ideas and institutions fairly?

First, many of them were tone-dear about religion until recently. Playing catch up ball, they make some mistakes. Second, more of them are learning. Third, religions often invite critical, suspicious, and unfair scrutiny and reportage. Third, since religions complete, what one will reject another will accept. How cover Muslim-Christian/Jewish relations in times of insecurity. Fourth: religions don't always treat the media fairly, so they can say, "look who's talking."

I know that there are also professional gripers and vigilantes who guard the good name of their religion, so that none but an insider dare speak up. Still and all, however it was in the past, when religion was more readily ignored, today there are genuine efforts to "get it right," and discerning viewers and hearers can find plenty of positives.

The old epigraph on poetry magazine was "To have great poets there have to be great audiences." So with constituencies of the religions: they have to be greater audiences, more discerning, more ambitious, more demanding, to see the emergence of more good media coverages.

By Martin Marty  |  March 28, 2007; 4:05 PM ET
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