Christianity

On Saturday's Fox News Watch, regular panel member Jim Pinkerton of The American Conservative magazine cited an article by MRC analyst and NewsBuster Matthew Balan, who recounted the media obsession with the Komen foundation's decision to eliminate funding for Planned Parenthood, while the same media have completely ignored the brewing conflict between President Obama and the Catholic Church as the Obama administration tries to force Catholic employers to go against their religious beliefs and provide coverage for contraception in its health insurance plans. Pinkerton:

On Friday's Inside Washington on PBS, as the panel discussed the new Obama administration rule that requires even Catholic employers to provide health insurance coverage for contraception to their employees, both liberal columnist Mark Shields and conservative columnist Charles Krauthammer hit Obama for the decision, while NPR's Nina Totenberg claimed that there were valid arguments in both directions as she made a flawed analogy between contraception and immunization as a defense of the Obama position.

But the blunt criticism directed at Obama by the liberal Shields, who is also a longtime regular on the PBS NewsHour, was the most surprising part of the show. After host Gordon Peterson noted that some Catholic leaders had supported Obamacare, and asked if they are "being hung out to dry," Shields responded:

CNN's Wolf Blitzer was apparently quite moved by President Obama's speech at Thursday's National Prayer Breakfast. Blitzer hailed it as a candid address and noted that the President spoke "very movingly" of his faith.

Of course, Obama's profession of his faith came shortly after his administration mandated religious-affiliated organizations to act against their church's teaching, a decision that caused great uproar. Blitzer did not mention that fact, but did cast Obama in a positive light as opposed to GOP candidate Mitt Romney. [Video below the break. Click here for audio.]

The Big Three networks continued their blackout on covering the controversy involving the Obama administration trying to force Catholic institutions to include coverage of abortifacients and contraception in their health plans without a co-pay. Instead, Diane Sawyer on Wednesday's ABC World News highlighted Pfizer's recall of birth control pills that could "raise the risk of accidental pregnancy."

The same evening, both CBS Evening News and NBC Nightly News aired reports on Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation discontinuing its funding of abortion perpetrator Planned Parenthood, with NBC's Brian Williams hyping how "thousands of women...[may]  pay the biggest price" for the move.

On their Wednesday morning shows, the Big Three networks continued their trend of all but ignoring the Obama administration trying to force religious institutions to include coverage of sterilization, abortion-inducing drugs, and contraceptives in their health care policies without a co-pay. The new mandate from the Department of Health and Human Services would force Catholic hospitals and schools to decide whether to submit to the new policy or follow the Church's teachings against birth control.

Instead of covering this growing dispute between the Catholic hierarchy of the United States and the federal government, CBS This Morning brought on Rev. Edward Beck, a Catholic priest, to respond to a story that might cast the Church in a bad light with regards to how it manages the donations it receives.

Fox News's Ed Henry challenged White House Press Secretary Jay Carney during a Tuesday briefing over the growing controversy surrounding the Obama administration's move on January 20 to force most employers to cover sterilization, abortion-inducing drugs, and contraceptives in their health care policies without co-pay. This new federal mandate would force Catholic institutions, like hospitals and schools, to decide whether to obey it or follow the Church's teachings against contraception.

Anchor Megyn Kelly trumpeted that "this is turning into a big deal, and the White House... [is] saying they believe they have struck the appropriate balance...the Catholic Church...saying, how is it the appropriate balance to delay...the time at which we'd have to violate our consciences?"  [video clip below the jump] The Big Three networks, on the other hand, have all but ignored the issue during the past 11 days. Only CBS This Morning on Tuesday briefly mentioned the growing controversy.

The Brian Williams MSNBC debate in Florida was not only dreadfully boring – I never thought I could ever long for commercials – it was pathetic. Freed of the fear of triggering an avalanche of applause against loaded questions, Williams and his co-moderators couldn’t bring themselves to utter one single question asking the Republican candidates to respond to Obama mistakes. For almost two hours, not one Obama failure was cited. Apparently, his record is spotless.

Instead, the candidates (especially Rick Santorum) were thrown four questions surrounding the 2005 legal battle in Florida over pulling the feeding tube of Terri Schiavo, which pushed all the liberal media hot buttons about “far right” religious conservatives throwing their religion around where it didn’t belong. This isn’t breaking news. But like the ABC debate fixated on contraception, it’s evidence that liberal networks are focused on their agenda, not on the voters’ concerns.

John H. Cushman, Jr. of the New York Times almost completely slanted to the left in his Friday article about the Obama administration's decision to force religious organizations to include free contraception in their employee insurance plans. Cushman quoted from HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, liberal Senator Barbara Boxer and the president of notorious pro-abortion "Catholics for Choice," but only included a six-word quote from the other side of the debate.

The writer led his post on the liberal paper's political blog, The Caucus, by noting that "the Obama administration said it would give religious organizations one additional year to comply with a new policy requiring employers to provide free contraception services in insurance plans. Roman Catholic bishops and other church leaders had protested the new rules, which were announced in August."

Check out the following alarming headline for a story from National Public Radio (NPR):

“Catholic Church Still Hiding Sexual Predators?”

Wow. That is a provocative and disturbing headline, indeed. The thought that the Catholic Church is “still hiding sexual predators” in 2012 is very troubling. It surely seems to be an article worth investigating.

Appearing as a guest on Thursday's Chelsea Lately show on the E! network to promote his book, The New New Rules, HBO's Bill Maher denied that a sexual joke he made last February about ABC's Elisabeth Hasselbeck and CBS's Lara Logan was a reference to the rape of Logan in Egypt from that month, as he recounted that he actually made the joke on his Real Time show before Logan's sexual assault occurred.

On Friday's CBS Evening News, anchor Scott Pelley tagged Rick Santorum as the "very conservative Pennsylvania Senator" as he introduced a full report on the GOP presidential candidate's views on gay rights, abortion, and contraception, with correspondent Dean Reynolds warning that the GOP candidate's views on social issues that helped him in Iowa "have energized his opponents here in New Hampshire."

After noting a recent poll shows Santorum "coming on strong" in the Granite State since his near win in the Iowa caucuses, Pelley, applied the "very conservative" label to the Pennsylvania Republican:

During Saturday's GOP presidential debate in New Hampshire hosted by ABC, after two of the moderators - World News anchor Diane Sawyer and local ABC affiliate anchor Josh McElveen - had devoted six minutes to a discussion of what the candidates would say to a gay couple "sitting in your living rooms" about same-sex marriage and adoption, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich highlighted the double standard in the media's left-leaning sympathy toward gay rights issues but lack of concern about anti-Christian "bigotry" from the left. Gingrich complained: (Video below)

At the same time that the nation's leading networks can't call Obama a "liberal" more than about once a year, NPR's religion reporter Barbara Bradley Hagerty on Monday announced Rick Santorum was "very, very conservative" on the social issues, in addition to being "very pro-life." He even -- horrors! -- home-schools his seven children.

"He's Catholic. He's billed himself very much as the family values candidate," the reporter announced on NPR's afternoon show Talk of The Nation. "His wife Karen has homeschooled all seven of their children. He's surging in the polls because he's been very, very conservative on these issues." They also discussed if white conservative Christians dislike Obama because they're racists.

On Wednesday's Good Morning America, ABC staff could be heard laughing in the background when substitute news reader Dan Harris recited the less vulgar part of HBO comedian Bill Maher's infamous tweet mocking Denver Broncos quarterback Tim Tebow's religious beliefs. (Video below)

After informing viewers that there were calls for a boycott against Maher's HBO show over the "controversial tweet," Harris continued:

Imagine the media attention that would be garnered if any non-Muslim in the U.S. did something as sensationalistically violent and dramatic as to dress as Santa Claus and commit a mass murder against his own family at a Christmas gathering.

But this past weekend, a Muslim man in Texas who was reportedly angry at his family for becoming too westernized committed just such an egregious act, resulting in the deaths of seven people, as documented this morning by FNC's Fox and Friends. (Video below)

New York Times media reporter Jeremy Peters was seeing things in Wednesday’s story on secret, “dog-whistle” religious appeals by GOP candidates past and present: “Appealing to Evangelicals, Hopefuls Pack Religion Into Ads.”

“Dog-whistle politics” is a derogatory term, often employed to describe what liberals consider to be coded, subliminal racist messages “pitched” too high for the general public to recognize. Peters, who seems suspicious of the idea of appealing to evangelical Christians, gets in a dig at Catholics to boot.

On Saturday's NBC Nightly News, during a report recounting the gathering of Christian pilgrims in Bethlehem for Christmas celebrations, correspondent Martin Fletcher relayed Palestinian complaints about Israel, and gave attention to the display of an anti-Israel publicity stunt set to coincide with the occasion taking advantage of a Christmas tree theme.

(Video below)

Recently, nearly 8,000 fans have petitioned the Denver Broncos to participate in an online campaign against the bullying of gay teens. But the team has declined to join "It Gets Better," saying it is already, "committed to tolerance, acceptance and respect for all in the community."

But that wasn't enough for liberal media like the Huffington Post - they are intent on blaming their favorite punching bag, Christian quarterback Tim Tebow for the team's decision.

You'd think a former Catholic seminarian would be happy about Christian athletes who are unashamed to publicly praise Jesus Christ. But then again, this is Bill Press we're talking about.

Our friend Brian Maloney at Radio Equalizer notes how the left-wing talker and CNN Crossfire alumnus declared on his December 15 radio program that the Denver Broncos quarterback should shut the [expletive] up:

District Attorney Charles J. Hynes, of Kings County, New York, recently announced that in the last three years 85 accused child predators have been arrested in Brooklyn's Orthodox Jewish community. The cases involve at least 117 alleged victims.

One man, Andrew Goodman, has been charged on 144 stomach-turning counts of sexually abusing two Orthodox boys – one from 11 to 15 years old, the other 13 to 16.

Tuesday's Morning Edition on NPR slanted toward TLC's controversial "All American Muslim" series by playing sound bites from two who support the reality TV show versus only one opponent. Correspondent Elizabeth Blair also failed to mention that one of the supporters works for the left-leaning Center for American Progress, while clearly identifying the opponent as being from a "conservative" group.

Host Renee Montagne noted in her introduction to Blair's report that "criticism against the home improvement chain Lowe's isn't letting up. It started after Lowe's dropped its ads from the reality TV show, 'All-American Muslim,' in response to pressure from a conservative Christian group. Now, an online petition has nearly 20,000 signatures, calling on the store to reinstate the ads."

Nightline co-anchor Terry Moran delivered a surprisingly positive assessment of Tim Tebow on Monday night, lauding the Christian quarterback as "inspired," "lifted up" and "strengthened" by "a power beyond his understanding."

Moran also highlighted, "Psychologists are increasingly finding that the very fact that a person has religious faith can help lead to the kind of success Tim Tebow has had." It wasn't all complimentary, however, the program's journalists repeatedly went out of their way to assert just how "controversial" Tebow is.

Every year, millions of Christians that celebrate the birth of their Savior are faced with the attacks on Christmas - "holiday trees," atheist ad campaigns and even outright blasphemy in mocking nativity scenes. To Christians and conservatives, the evidence is overwhelming. But in recent years, the left and the mainstream media have actively denied that the war even exists.

From the hard left gang of current and former MSNBC personalities to CNN hosts to Huffington Post writers, the watch words have been "fake" and "phony" and "ridiculous." With varying degrees ire, they've blamed Fox News and the "Christian right" for the "manufactured outrage" at attacks on Christmas.

In a report for Monday's NBC Today, correspondent Peter Alexander described the rise of Denver Broncos quarterback Tim Tebow, noting how the NFL player's devout Christian faith has earned him the nickname of "God's Quarterback." Alexander went on to declare: "Many Americans were first introduced to Tebow during this controversial anti-abortion ad that aired during the 2010 Super Bowl."

While Alexander's report only featured a brief clip of the ad, if the full spot had been shown, viewers would have seen for themselves the complete lack of controversy in the commercial. In fact, the ad never even used the word abortion.

ABC, CBS, and NBC's morning shows on Monday all used news briefs to highlight how home improvement giant Lowe's is "facing a backlash" after it pulled its ads from TLC's "All-American Muslim" reality TV series. All three noted that the company reacted to a complaint from a "conservative" or "Christian" group who threatened a boycott. CBS's Early Show played up how Lowe's "critics call that bigotry."

NBC's Natalie Morales stated in her brief that the chain is "sparking outrage after its pulled its ads from a reality show about American Muslims. The retail giant bowed to pressure from an evangelical Christian group, which called for a boycott against the chain of home improvement stores." Morales added that a "California state senator, meanwhile, says he is considering a boycott and legislative action if the company does not reverse its decision."