After the 1967 Presidential Prayer Breakfast, a group of newspaper correspondents and religion writers in Washington, D. C., met for a symposium. They discussed the special duty of laymen whose vocations engage them influentially in the mass media in a time of moral crisis.
Participants were Leland A. Bandy, Washington correspondent of the “Columbia (S. C.) State”; Mrs. Lillian Brooks Brown, TV-radio program coordinator, American University; Louis Cassels, religion editor, United Press International; Miss Ella F. Harllee, president, Educational Communication Association; David E. Kucharsky, associate editor, CHRISTIANITY TODAY; Edmund B. Lambeth, Washington Bureau, Gannett Newspapers; Al Manola, editor, NAHB “Journal of Homebuilding”; Caspar Nannes, religion editor, “Washington Evening Star”; and William Willoughby, Washington correspondent for Religious News Service. Moderating the discussion was Editor Carl F. H. Henry ofCHRISTIANITY TODAY.
Henry: Everyone here presumably has a spiritual commitment and is related to the world of the mass media in a time of moral crisis in world history. A few years ago when I was interviewing Charles Malik, former chairman of the United Nations General Assembly, he said in the course of the interview, “Jesus Christ is the hinge of history.” Now, if we are church-related, and vocationally engaged at frontiers of the mass media, in a time of ethical and spiritual crisis, does some special obligation accrue to us to give visibility to Jesus Christ as the hinge of history? And if so, how? Again, over and above being skillful journalists in respect to all that good journalism implies as a vocation, do we have any responsibility of putting the right questions to our generation, of forcing upon it a struggle for answers to the right questions? Is it our duty to force a critical examination of accepted values and unconscious assumptions?
Lambeth: This is the first time that I’ve ever really attempted to answer this question—not from an individual point of view, because we’ve all sweated out stories, asking ourselves how we should handle them, and whether we are being honest, in reporting—but in a corporate sense, having to sit down with colleagues and thresh around the problem.
Kucharsky: It might be well to look back in history and see how people in related professions have done. So far as journalists go, the only monumental case that I can think of is Milton’s Areopagitica, which does a tremendous job of relating faith to a current problem—a problem that was current then and is even current now. Certainly in the field of literature and art, people were creative as a result of their Christian commitment in a way that we’re not seeing today.
Lambeth: The thought that lodges in mind this morning as an obvious opener is that some of the most responsible and hard-hitting daily journalism comes from non-Christians. I think that needs saying, first because Christians obviously have no monopoly on editing or reporting skill. Neither do Christian journalists have any corner on commitment to solving the problems that plague us now, twenty centuries after the time of Jesus. But most importantly, I think the point needs to be made because one of the significant contributions a Christian reporter can make may lie in an area that is rooted in but goes beyond his daily duties.
Bandy: I agree that our moral obligation extends beyond our professional lives. I think it extends to our own private and personal lives.
Cassels: But anybody who tells you that you can do Christian service only “after hours,” in a part-time way, when explicitly talking about what the Bible says, does a great disservice. For Christ spoke of the believing community, the community of faith, as a leaven that is most effective when it is lost into the loaf. It doesn’t stand up and say, “I am the leaven, look at me.” It just does its work. I think you are most truly discharging your Christian vocation when you are being a good newspaper man. If I understand it correctly, Martin Luther’s doctrine of vocation, which is one of the unsung glories of the Protestant heritage, says precisely this. It is not only when the cobbler is on his knees praying that he is being a Christian, but also when the cobbler is on his bench making a good pair of shoes. From what I heard, you are discharging your Christian vocation now, and I’ve no doubt you’re doing it tremendously well. You should know this, and have the satisfaction of knowing that your nine-to-five work is a true Christian vocation.
Henry: Let’s agree that at the very least Christianity has implications for everyone’s private morality, and for a spirituality that requires personal commitment. But the cobbler who doesn’t make a good pair of shoes can do as much harm to his Christian testimony through his vocation as all the time that he spends …
Lambeth: I couldn’t agree with you more. I don’t deny that. If I had to weigh the two in the balance, I would probably say being a good reporter is the more important on a percentage basis. But when the question is asked, what special obligation is on our shoulder by relationship to the media, then over and above that I feel that Martin Marty hits on a valid point. Let me quote a review of Marty’s work by Time magazine (Dec. 7,1964): “Marty speculates that the embattled Christian minority—now 28 per cent of the world population—will continue to shrink under the advance of hostile systems and because of its own internal weaknesses. Only those Christians who are ‘heavily oriented toward Biblical interpretation, historical thought and contemporary analysis’ can, in Marty’s view, minister to a changing world. ‘It may be questioned,’ he writes, ‘whether the churches have really taken seriously the possibility that the believing community might virtually disappear.’ ” I don’t accept the view—and I don’t think many do—that only those Christians heavy on biblical training and contemporary analysis can minister to today’s world. Far from it. But Marty seems very close to the mark when he says that such persons are sorely needed in a world that increasingly challenges the idea of Jesus as Lord. It would seem that a source of such talent, perhaps neglected, is the daily and weekly press. Certainly no group has a better window on the “real world”—of poverty amid affluence, of rapid technological change and scientific promise, of bureaucracy, both public and private.
Bandy: We as journalists should report these problems—poverty, civil rights, and so forth. But as individual Christians I think we sit back, and while aware of these problems, all we do is sit around and discuss them. I think there is a question of involvement as individual Christians which comes up here.
Nannes: I’d like to put it in the press frame, as far as I’m concerned. Your question here is, What duty does the fact of our vocational relationship to the mass media impose upon us in this time of moral and spiritual crisis? I think we should divide our jobs, particularly those of us directly concerned with newspapers, into two areas. First, there is the area of just reporting a meeting. I think one would satisfy his Christian responsibility by reporting the meeting honestly, fairly, and completely; I don’t think one has any right to go beyond that when meeting such as we did here today [the Presidential Prayer Breakfast], The other aspect is when a writer has a place where he can express himself with some allowance for subjectivity, as one does when writing a column. And in that sense one can bring out Christian convictions in relation to the questions that are affecting and plaguing the world today. But as working newspaper men I think we must clearly differentiate those two areas.
Henry: Do you all accept the premise, if I represent it rightly, that interpretative reporting is allowable only in the writing of columns and doesn’t in any way intrude into news?
Cassels: Interpretative reporting shouldn’t get subjective. There might be a middle ground between the two.
Manota: Everybody who works in Washington and knows anything about the newspaper business recognizes how far the Washington Post, for example, has gone beyond the bounds of what was normally considered interpretative reporting when its news stories express opinions.
Willoughby: I have serious misapprehensions about the religious press falling unwittingly into the trap I choose to call ecumenical overkill. By that I mean the practice of ascribing, often to the point of ludicrousness, the flavor of the ecumenical spirit or ecumenism to anything and everything, regardless of how insignificant or fabricated the interfaith aspect of an event might be. For instance, Francis Cardinal Spellman and Billy Graham were invited to the White House for lunch with the President. United Nations Ambassador Arthur Goldberg also was there. I played the story straight, for what I saw it was worth, and noticed afterwards that the wire services had done the same. But a rewrite man encased the whole thing—not at all designed as an ecumenical encounter by the President—in the overworked language of ecumenism: the Catholic archbishop, the Baptist evangelist, the Disciples President, and the Jewish ambassador. It mattered only secondarily that the real concern was front-line reports by the religious leaders on the war in Viet Nam. A thin, tawdry veneer of “ecumenical spirit” was made the illicit carrying force of a story that moved along well on its own legitimate merits. Ecumenism and manifestations of the ecumenical spirit are legitimate forces at work in the world today. The faithful newsman, naturally, is fully aware of that and reports it for what it is. But he also is able to see behind the scenes. Much that, on the surface, at least, appears to be genuine interfaith, ecumenical concern is but a thinly disguised promotion gimmick under the label of a peace rally, a congressional hearing, or a rights protest. Public relationists know full well that if in some manner they can get the interfaith aspect across, they’re going to get much more space in the news media than if they did it denuded of the banner of ecumenism. As I see it, ecumenism is a powerful force at work among the religionists of our day. But it can carry its own weight. Newsmen need to discern the props planted by enthusiasts and at the same time not add props of their own. Ecumenical overkill only garbles the real message.
Lambeth: I want to second what Caspar Nannes said about a rigid line between news stories, interpretative stories, and columns of opinion. The point I am trying to make will be completely missed if I leave an impression that biblically based interpretation of events is something I recommend for the daily or weekly press in this country. Indeed, there are compelling professional and other reasons to keep the daily or weekly press secular. Readers, it should go without saying, are entitled to objectivity. Interpretation, when it is needed, should be free from a reporter’s theological leanings. But in the nation’s magazines of opinion and perhaps on the air waves, a newsman—committed, yet not a zealot—can make an important contribution. None of this is to downgrade the daily, nine-to-five work of a journalist attempting to be a Christian. The story—accurate, objective, and fully told—is a good day’s gift. Some will say, for good reasons, that this is enough. Yet I think an obligation—no, I should say opportunity—exists for the Christian journalist to enter a larger dialogue. It is not so much that he has any special corner on “truth” as it is that he moves in orbits that can contribute uniquely to the placing of modern life in a Christian context.
Henry: My impression is that the line is not to be drawn between interpretative and non-interpretative reporting. All history is selective, and probably no one has to be more selective in the reporting of facts because of pressures of space and time than the journalist writing a news story. He has to distinguish between what he thinks is important and what he thinks is unimportant. And isn’t the difference between interpretative reporting and objectionably subjective reporting a recasting of material to reflect highly subjective prejudices? Isn’t the wisdom of the ages a proper climate for all interpretation? Doesn’t it lead us again to the question of raising the right issues or pressing upon our generation the need to answer certain basic questions about the values and uncritical assumptions of our time? Would this in any way intrude upon our proper journalistic role?
Manola: It seems to me that you’re trying to force us to say that people in the communication media should use their position to get across either the wisdom of the ages or their own personal wisdom. The Washington Post for thirty years had a city editor who was a devout Catholic. If a robe slipped off a bishop, there was a big story in the Washington Post. Down South, if an editor happens to be a Southern Baptist, the front page is full of it. This is absurd.
Cassels: I think the biggest danger of all in our business is succumbing to the temptation to be a propagandist instead of a reporter. The people who do succumb to that temptation invariably believe they are doing it for a righteous cause. They’re always sure God is on their side.
Bandy: Well, I’m not involved in religious writing as such on Capitol Hill, which is 100 per cent pure politics. But I feel that as a Christian I have a moral obligation to report the news honestly, fairly, and objectively. And as a Christian I do not think my life is divided between the secular and the sacred. I feel that everything I do is sacred. But that doesn’t mean I have to be a crusader in my hard news copy for theology or religion. I think I am setting an example as a Christian by reporting the hard news honestly, fairly, and objectively.
Henry: I just don’t yield the premise that anyone is wholly objective in reporting information. If those of us now gathered around this table were reporting the events in the New Testament Gospels, or the Acts, some very illuminating material would likely be deleted or recast.
Cassels: I would much rather have these people reporting it than somebody who thought that he should put the stamp of what he deeply believed to be right and true upon whatever he expressed. The most wicked, essentially unchristian, and sinful thing a reporter can do is to smuggle into his treatment of a story his own deep convictions, because the person who is most certain of his own righteousness is precisely the one who is most likely to do a propaganda job.
Nannes: Every once in awhile we’ve gotten into discussions with some of our people whose meetings we are covering. They become quite indignant about the fact that we may report something which is unpleasant to them. I feel very strongly that newspapers must not be propagandists for religion or any religious body. But 96 per cent of what religion and religious bodies do is good, and just the solid reporting of it is doing a service without our going out of our way. On the other hand, we should not be asked to gloss over errors—and worse—that sometimes occur among church people. To do that is not honest reporting, or being an honest Christian or religious man, at all. Now as to the question: sure, no man can be completely objective, because in his selection of what he is going to write about, his own personal evaluation must come in. But there is all the difference in the world between somebody who is trying as hard as he can to be objective and somebody who is trying to slant a story so as to reflect his own particular views.
Memo To Missionaries
You can’t find a single evangelical magazine in the United States on the average newsstand, not a single one. As a matter of fact, you can’t find any religious periodical of any kind, evangelical or otherwise. And with all the millions of magazine pages printed in this country each week, covering everything from stamp collecting to skiing, not one publication is used primarily for newsstand evangelism. Spiritually hungry souls have no publication readily available to help them find Christ. How can we address another culture when the culture that we’re most familiar with has no such medium? At this all-important phase of modern communication, we’re closed off from the world, hiding our light.
Another major point on which our communications breakdown occurs is the lack of liaison with the secular press. What kind of contact do you have with the foreign correspondent in the area that you serve and the people that work even with the national newspapers, people who are the professional communicators and who will reach the mass audiences? How many of you have ever called upon a foreign correspondent in your work overseas, just for any reason at all—to befriend him, perhaps, or to give him a tip?
Don’t worry about getting your work publicized; that’ll come in time, because he’s after stories much more than you’re after getting your work publicized.
People want to read about what’s going on in the foreign missionary enterprise. And yet CHRISTIANITY TODAY receives less missionary news than any other kind. We’re flooded with other news, but it’s hard to come by good missionary news, to find out what’s going on in foreign countries where Christians are proclaiming the Word of God. Then you good missionaries, for some reason or other, sit on the news until it’s too stale for us to use, or you fail to give us the substance of the story. I sometimes despair. Why can’t we get at least a few people overseas to write some engaging copy with color and clarity?
I believe the work of the Lord would be enhanced if all persons connected with religious work would be prepared to recognize a news story.
I think we need people today who are bold and who are willing to be guided by the Holy Spirit and pioneer in new territory, and I commend it to you in the area of literature.—DAVID E. KUCHARSKY, associate editor of CHRISTIANITY TODAY, in remarks to Evangelical Literature Overseas regional conference in Fort Washington, Pennsylvania.
Willoughby: A news writer on religion needs to be careful that he does not carry his own bias on religion into his stories. I, personally, am of conservative Protestant persuasion in religion and of liberal persuasion in politics and social implementation. Others of you, I know, are of liberal theological persuasion. It is easy for you and me, if we are not extremely careful, to approach religious news with our own biases, through jaundiced eyes. I do not mean that we would editorially distort our reporting, but we could editorialize either by emphasis or by underemphasis. For instance, a writer of liberal theological persuasion or with a theologically libertarian viewpoint might tend to downgrade a Billy Graham or an “old-time religion” oration by Senator Everett Dirksen—or, at the other extreme of the conservative spectrum, what might be a perfectly valid statement made by Carl Mclntire on a timely and pertinent topic. On the other hand, anything a Malcolm Boyd, Harvey Cox, or even Bishop Pike might say would get top billing. In other words, if the liberal writer thinks Boyd or Cox or Pike is more relevant to today’s needs (and the writer must make this evaluation on what he personally thinks the needs of man and the Church are), he will give him the copy, no matter what he says (or how). Another man on the other side of the religious scene, regarded in the writer’s eyes as not sophisticated in his view and therefore less relevant, will be passed over or toned down. The conservatively oriented writer, on the other hand, might look askance at Boyd or Cox or Pike and tend to give them the same treatment. But, in the final analysis, so far as the public is concerned, does one man’s pronouncement necessarily carry more validity than the other’s? Are, too, the views of a Bishop Pike any less irresponsible than anything a Carl Mclntire might say? Does it necessarily follow, carrying the argument a step further, that merely because the religion editor of a newspaper happens to be a Unitarian, the most extensively quoted messages appearing in the Monday columns are those of Unitarians, when there are hundreds of ministers in the same city each Sunday who are saying something at least as significant?
Manola: Reporters should not be judges. They are onlookers; they have a responsibility to let people know as factually as possible what they see and what is happening. The thing that I’m afraid of is that in order to bring one’s Christian commitment into his work, and show it in his work, one is going to have to judge and evaluate people and actions from the standpoint of that commitment.
Willoughby: There exists among some writers on the religious aspect of the news the foregone conclusion that religious and quasi-religious organizations are always the “good guys” in a dispute, and that, for example, any government agency involved is to be numbered among the “bad guys.” Since much of the news on religion that has strong religio-political bearings originates in Washington, it is unfortunate that this news is still so loosely probed. Many times the real significance is occluded because a writer or editor is carried along on the spur of some potshot at a government agency or individual.
Henry: Must religious reporting cover movements and events only within the assumptions of the particular groups that are making the news? It ought of course to reflect those assumptions faithfully, to give visibility to the assumptions on which the work is being done. Can it with propriety set these assumptions alongside other long-range assumptions in assessing the distinctiveness of any movement? Does the discussion of long-range concerns from the lively perspective of history involve a reporter in any objectionable manifestation of subjectivism?
Harllee: Could I ask, in the field of journalism here, what the function of the denominational newspaper is as opposed to the secular newspaper? Is there a special justification in the denominational newspaper, let us say, for this type of approach?
Nannes: Of course, the denominational newspaper, by the mere fact that it is a denominational newspaper, has—I don’t know whether the word bias is too strong—but at least a point of view which we accept, just as when we read a column. We know a certain columnist will reflect, let us say, a liberal point of view, and when we start reading his column we accept that premise immediately. It’s the same with denominational newspapers. They completely justify their existence, and I like to read them. But their approach is completely different from that of the ordinary newspaper.
Brown: How far do I carry personal commitment and how far do I carry professional mandate? I’m a television producer at the American University. I’ve just put on a new show which I’m sure I put on because I’m a Christian. It’s going to be called “Communicate!” The thirteen shutters will each feature a chaplain of a different faith, and each chaplain will bring interfaith students to the cameras in one of our major television stations simply to kick around the ideas that they have—in other words, to communicate with each other. My personal commitment has made me do something in the field of religion. But my professional mandate from a commercial station is that I make it interfaith and hold no jurisdiction over the chaplains as to subjects and over what students say.
Manola: I can sympathize with you because I’m a member of the executive committee of the Radio and Television Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention. We have produced programs which they tell me resulted in $3.5 million worth of free time, including the network slice. Our radio and TV programs include the “sell,” but it’s “soft.”
Brown: I think that kids are beating their brains out to figure out who they are, whether they’re Christians or whether they’re beatniks or what. Giving them a chance to talk this over with a responsible person helps them sort out all their opinions. Making it totally interfaith and giving it no mandate at all is really maybe the best you can do. But my show is not a religious show.
Harllee: It’s so frustrating in a sense, because the whole issue is raised here in the broadcasting field. My experience has been that we really have a terrible dilemma. From our mail we keep discovering that religion has yet to be a personal thing as far as reaching the man where he is out there in the television audience or radio audience. You can theorize, you can be impersonal, you can try to be impartial; but it seems to us that the need of people remains a real need. They look to a personality who can interpret this.
Bandy: I think the problem of shrinking Christianity is that we’ve got too many professionals and not enough laymen working at it.
