Ahh, Okaaaaay, the Globe has a new all things to all Roman Catholics section/website called CRUX. It’s gonna keep us abreast of the latest happenings in the Vatican I suppose.
What’s this all about? That’s my question. Shouldn’t this be a general religion section with yes, because of demographics, an emphasis on Catholicism, but Judaism, currently going through major changes, Islam, and of course those nameless faceless people that go to the mostly wooden Protestant churches have boatloads of members too.
The Golden Rule is the common theme in religions and this website should mostly be about that. What the churches and religions are doing in furtherance of it and such. People need to be reminded what the real meaning of the religions are and how it manifests itself in the community. Both good and bad.
Will CRUX do this?
With big hoopla Margery Egan joined the Boston Globe yesterday. She’s a Roman Catholic from Fall River.
[She] will be the spirituality columnist for Crux, focusing on “issues of spirituality, contemplation, and devotion, drawing on her personal experience with her Catholic faith, as well as that of other Catholics and those of various religious traditions.”
Anyone familiar with Margery’s writing and her radio personality know she is not intellectually curious and routinely unfamiliar with many things unavoidable to know by anyone with her resume.
Sure she is a Roman Catholic but she shows zero understanding or appreciation of Catholicism as a religion. Not the Church, but the teachings of the Gospel and the writings of people such as St. Thomas Moore and such.
Okay, who cares? Well Margery has a obsession with woman in the priesthood and the Church’s old time position on contraception, abortion, gay marriage.
Okay, understood. But guess what? Those aren’t big problems. Poverty and justice are. That’s it. The Golden Rule.
Margery writes like a self-hating ill informed and lazy (did I mention lazy in her approach – worse than me) Catholic with a narrow minded focus on issues which at this point in history mean squat. If you don’t believe me walk into the closest gas station and take a look at the rack of condoms.
So I have two points.
1. Is this website an attempt to cater to the common perception of the Boston ethnic Catholic (Irish and Italian) to win them over for the propaganda that comes with it or is it a naive attempt by John Henry to win over the populace which to him are the same as Red Sox fans?
Does Henry look down upon us like The British Empire looked down upon the Irish and Indians and South Africans?
If this was a more encompassing concept I wouldn’t be suspect.
2. Does Margery Eagan’s record of opinion and knowledge qualify her to write as a credible and intelligent someone who grew up in the religion and witnessed its dynamics and idiosyncrasies, good and bad?
—-
So the Wall Street Journal prints an op-ed yesterday detailing what a dick-head Arthur T. DeMoulas is and questions why he is getting a free pass in the Boston media. Here’s the last sentence from the knowledgeable columnist.
[It]pays to look under the hood, which some of the Boston media might have bothered to do before turning the Demoulas battle into a good guy vs. bad guy corporate morality tale.
You see people? I’m not the only one who thinks we have a bunch of frauds in this town creating the news rather than reporting it.
JimC says
I think hiring Margery is savvy, in that she understands the publication has to be readable, and the Harvard Divinity School grads might neglect that aspect. They also get a splash from hiring her.
Savvy in the short term; I think she’ll get bored in the long term.
This is nicely done:
jconway says
I thought Crux was the brainchild of John Allen, whom the Globe snagged from the National Catholic Reporter? His columns in the Globe have been just as good as what he wrote at NCR, and he is a biographer and expert on the last three popes, even putting Bergoglio on his short list when nobody was expecting him to have a shot. He is the Nate Silver of the Conclave!
Why on Earth did they pair him with Eagen? We already have the Cullen’s and Curran’s advocating for those changes nobody outside the American church cares about or wants. Don’t see what a third will offer us. It also isn’t supplanting the religious section, the Globe wants to be a national paper of record for Catholic issues and actually has a good track record on the best with their abuse coverage and with bringing Allen on board. This is a step backward though.
SomervilleTom says
It seems to me that there are ample publications available for those who “Roman Catholic news”.
I’d prefer to see the Globe focus its already meager reporting resources on investigating and reporting news of more general appeal.
SomervilleTom says
Clicked “Submit” to quickly.
jconway says
He is a well renowned objective reporter who covers his beat by getting scoops nobody else gain and providing higher quality analysis than most reporters do for their beats. He is not simply repeating talking points, press releases, or talking about local events. The global church is an interesting area to cover, particularly under this Pope, and I actually applaud the Globe for beefing up it’s coverage here. How Egan fits in, how this impacts other religious reporting, and why it needs a separate ‘brand’ like the Post’s ‘The Fix’ is beyond me. But there is a niche and they can fill it better than most with Allen and the other reporters they have.
Christopher says
….they would give the same consideration to the largest Protestant denomination in the state, one that ties in with so much of our past.
jconway says
That’s the problem.
Christopher says
…but that’s probably too old:)
Seriously, it wasn’t always bad news. The Archbishop of Boston is treated like a public figure in the press. His statements make the news. His installation was televised. People know his name whether they are Catholic or not. The same can’t be said for the MACUCC Minister-President. The vast majority of his own denomination don’t know him from Adam.
jconway says
Either marry or bury a few Kennedy’s like Cushing and Spellman did, lead a Nixonian cover up like Law did , or become papabile like O’Malley.
You’re moderator is welcome to do any of those things to raise attention. I might add, I often wish my church was in the news far less, don’t think I’m alone in that regard either.
Christopher says
The media don’t take the bait and he has mentioned to me his challenges with the Globe specifically.
jconway says
We do have 3.9 million more members than the UCC in MA alone, and the UCC having 121,000 to begin with actually puts it at the highest protestant denomination in MA. So that is a huge disparity, granted, I think your membership numbers are a lot more honest since you only count adults who register to be members while the number I cited is likely from baptismal certificates.
Sadly, even though you do outnumber the Episcopalians, they seem to get more coverage. Maybe you guys need to have more schisms, vestments, and mitres, and of course more scandals. Scandals sell, you’re guy has a lot of work to do to catch up with us ;)!
Christopher says
…(and you all wonder why I have a thing for pomp), or maybe the similarity to Catholicism that Catholic reporters understand. I think I’ll accept the fact that we actually know how to deal with a pastor who might not be safe rather than let it become a scandal, thank you:) As for membership, though this is in some transition the Conference policy had encouraged churches to cull their roles since the dues were assessed on a per member basis.
SomervilleTom says
My point is that if I want to read news about the Roman Catholic church, there are many choices.
I used to be a able to read a daily newspaper that had reasonable coverage of international and national issues (enough that generally knew what was happening), in-depth coverage of local news, some sports (although my father, a sports fan from Washington DC, complained that the Globe ignored all but Boston teams), and a variety of informed and articulate editorial and opinion pieces.
Today, that same newspaper seems to offer a choice of Red Sox score-cards, Catholic news, sappy “human interest” stories, more Red Sox trivia, some superficially-liberal editorials, and an increasing number of right-leaning opinion pieces presented as news (see any piece by Noah Bierman). Too often, those articulate opinion pieces are replaced by comics (see today’s piece by Ward Sutton) or screeds by discredited right-wing clowns like Mr. Sununu.
The Globe doesn’t need more Catholic news. I’d prefer that those resources (both people and column-space) be dedicated to investigative reporting and follow-up. What, for example, did Brian Mirasolo DO after being appointed the youngest chief probation officer ever? What did Ms. Petrolati and Ms. Burke DO as “Program Coordinator”? How much did the latter two offices cost the taxpayers, and what did we get for it?
Who else (besides Tim Murray) did the now-disgraced Michael McLaughlin raise money for? Why were they not indicted?
Who in the state prosecutors office knew of the pathologically inflated “productivity” of Annie Dookhan? Who handled the email complaints from Ms. Dookhan’s co-workers, and who was informed of those complaints?
Who are the lawyers, doctors, and “advisors” who operate the Boston police and fire department disability mill? What connections do they have to Beacon Hill and City Hall? How much of the resulting disability disbursements, fees, commissions, and so on finds its way back to the campaign coffers of those Beacon Hill and City Hall officials?
It’s not as if there is any dearth of juicy local dirt to find and reveal. It’s almost as if the paper prefers to keep it under the rug (except for the occasional “Spotlight” series).
ryepower12 says
is because they’re pushing this out to an international audience. The Globe’s even suggested it may turn this into a weekly print edition.
I don’t think they’re wrong to do this kind of stuff. Egan is a strange pick, though, but maybe she’ll surprise us?
jconway says
Allen is the Nate Silver of all things Catholic, and Cruz is his 538 so to speak. The Globe is smart to take the paywall off, and Allen is bringing traffic to the Globe that would otherwise ignore it. Frankly, he is the only reason I have been there lately. It’s a potential billion member audience, and Allen is smart to have a very global perspective when it comes to his style of coverage.
Egan is a strange pick. She is a local commodity, and not a particularly insightful one at that. About as smart as MSNBC hiring Mike Barnicle.
kirth says
it’s an endorsement, especially if it’s on the Editorial page. It’s the unalloyed voice of the One Per Cent.
ryepower12 says
The WSJ editorial page represents the interest of those who have Mitt Romney’s wealth (not to mention ideology) and beyond.
If I wanted to keep pretending ASD was in the right, I’d try to pretend the WSJ piece didn’t exist.
Hey Ernie — does your real name end with Demoulas?
JimC says
New sports section: Competition
New Metro section: City (or maybe Civitas)
New business section: Capital. No wait, Competition. No wait …
fenway49 says
Who (other than jconway ;-)) is going to read this section? As I see it people in Massachusetts (and nationwide) with Catholic heritage largely fall into one of three groups. First, a relatively large group who don’t really go to mass anymore and couldn’t care less about diocesan matters or Vatican intrigue. Then there are those who still go to mass but disagree with many of the church’s positions. Finally, a relatively small group who go to mass regularly and agree with the Church’s positions (even smaller still when you consider that many of those who agree with Church positions on sexual issues have drifted Republican and reject Church positions on economic and immigration issues).
I suppose a focus could be the struggle between the latter two groups for the direction of the Church, but the whole thing seems obsolete to me. Attendance at mass is way down. Parishes and Catholic schools are closing all over. The idea of a monolithic “Catholic bloc” of votes is largely gone. The days when a Boston archbishop could say the word and destroy a candidate or kill a bill in the legislature are long gone. I’ll have to check it out to understand what they’re trying to do, but I just don’t see the relevance. It’s like the Globe deciding today to create a whole new section about the burgeoning Irish population of Boston a century or so too late, when the moment already has passed. It seems about as passe as a section devoted to the New England textile industry or those columns about which Brahmin had which other Brahmin over for tea on Tuesday.
jconway says
1) Religious coverage does matter
I would argue that Religion sections in general are getting terribly downsized, my old Chicago Maroon Editor (and an expert on Christian Left and immigration politics) got sacked from the Tribune only a year into his stint as their religion reporter (he works for Mother Jones now). The Post has a decent religion analyst, but no longer covers it, and this affects non-Catholic coverage as well, as Christopher is well aware. Outside of the American Prospect, Mother Jones, and other lefty publications we see little coverage of the ‘Moral Monday Movement’, Christians concerned about Gaza, or the religious participation in Occupy. Instead the narrative gets surrounded by questions of sexual politics, the religious right, and the growing secularization of the Bluer portions of America. I think religious people can and do make a significant contribution to issues of social justice, they were the backbone of the original Progressive movement, the Social Gospel, muckrackers, and the early forebears of American socialist and labor movements. The Christian Science Monitor remains a great paper I might add, tied to a specific faith tradition but focused on great investigative coverage.
2) The Globe
I think if the Globe had the sense to hire David Bernstein for Boston Mag and John Allen for Crux, this is a sign that they are trying to get specific segments of their news to have a national focus. We want the Globe to be a national paper, and if it can be a go to source for news about a very popular and news worthy Pope, perhaps that can improve it’s other religious coverage, and also it’s coverage in other areas of the paper. Adding Eagan is a puzzling choice if that is their intention, so Tom and EB3’s critiques that it’s just Irish Catholics and Red Sox coverage might be valid on that point, but if this is the sign they are taking one beat incredibly seriously by hiring talented people, perhaps other beats will be improved as well.
They sacked their foreign news desk which used to get the most awards after the Times took over, I would rather the Globe, much like the Post, try and resolve the tension between local or national and choose. I think the future is in national and international news, and getting a segment of that correct (the country and the world’s largest denomination within it’s largest faith) could revitalize other sections.
If they can lure Allen, maybe they can lure other good reporters for vastly different beats.
fenway49 says
like it will be addressing your first point at all. And it may be just me, but I don’t see why it’s necessary to have a religion section, per se, to cover social justice movements in which religious people are participating.
On the second point, it just seems strange to me. I’m having a hard time picturing people from coast to coast caring enough about coverage of the Catholic Church to seek it out, and then deciding they have to get it from the Boston Globe. Largest denomination doesn’t mean much to me when lots of people are dropping out of religion altogether and many evangelical Protestant denominations still think of Catholicism as exotic or alien.
In the meantime, if they want to be a national paper the future’s either online or they better start selling it more broadly. I can’t even find the damn paper south or west of New Haven while every convenience store in New England sells the New York Post. In other countries the national papers are truly national and don’t have a century and a half’s worth of roots in a particular city.
jconway says
I know I read the Globe more because I follow John Allen and am a big fan of his work. I go to the Herald for sports coverage and local news, and mostly get my local political coverage from here and Bernstein. Allen has a dedicated national following that will bring audiences to the Globe who might otherwise forget it’s there. If they can hire away Jim Martin from America, Michael Sean Winters (a former Boston based writer) also from NCR they could have a real murderers row of Catholic journalists and opinion leaders. And it would add value.
My second point is, if they approach other more important areas of news the same way-hire well known credible reporters, build ‘brands’ around then, and have a robust online component it could work. I’d say Ezra Klein and Nate Silver did this under the old papers and their new solo efforts aren’t as successful since they are better content creators than content managers. Giving Allen free rein is an interesting experience that could be cross applied to areas you aren’t so averse to covering 😉
ryepower12 says
It’s being marketed to an international audience.
Hell, they’re turning the paywall *off* for this new section. That’s how much it isn’t being marketed to Massachusetts.
As for who would be interested in reading it… this atheist would.