Manya Brachear

There must be something in Chicagoland's drinking water which causes either acute memory loss or a persistent inability to pay attention.

First, we had presidential candidate Barack Obama, who sat in Jeremiah Wright's Trinity United Church of Christ for nearly two decades, but who supposedly had no idea Pastor Wright was so hostile towards America ("US KKK of A"), its history (we deserved the 9/11 attacks because of Hirsohima and Nagasaki), and its white citizens (the "white supremacy Rhetorical Ethic").

Now we have Roxanne Martino, a Chicago-area member of the University of Notre Dame's Board of Trustees, who resigned Wednesday after serving less than two months. The Cardinal Newman Society noted that Martino had made $27,150 in political contributions to Emily's List over a 12-year period. Her claim, relayed through the board's chairman and the university's president, is that she "didn't realize any of the organizations she supported also promoted abortion rights." Uh, Roxanne -- Emily's List has only one mission: "electing pro-choice Democratic women to office."

Here's some of the Chicago Tribune's skepticism-free take:

With the looming possibility of a government shutdown and today's Republican 2012 budget proposal, you can expect the media to be hard at work amplifying the complaints of liberal Democrats that conservative-proposed budget cuts are extreme.

Even newspaper sections or online features generally disconnected from politics are picking up on the meme. Take the Chicago Tribune's The Seeker blog, a religion news feature.

The last two blog posts have taken a liberal tack from a religious perspective on the federal budget.

"Faithful, legislators should ask, 'What would Jesus cut?'" Rev. Soong -Chan Rah argued in an April 4 post, echoing the rallying cry of liberal Christian activist Jim Wallis:

In what is easily the dopiest question I've read from a religion blogger in a while, Chicago Tribune's Manya Brachear closed her  December 8 The Seeker blog post by asking readers if "dissenters" like pro-choice nun Sister Donna Quinn of Chicago "strengthen the church." In November, Quinn went public with news that she has "been rebuked for escorting patients into a Hinsdale clinic that provides abortions."

In "Pro-choice nun still fighting for women's care," Brachear explained how Quinn "is not backing down from her support of abortion rights, applauding the defeat of an amendment today that would have added restrictions to the health care bill for women seeking abortions."

Oh, it gets worse. Quinn apparently used the Virgin Mary as cover for sanctifying her pro-abortion views:

In a June 28 "The Seeker" blog post asking, "[s]hould gay flocks have their own churches," Chicago Tribune religion reporter Manya Brachear failed to find a conservative, orthodox Christians or Jews to level a warning about the incompatibility of homosexuality and those faith traditions.

"Three area churches who cater to gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender Christians are marching in today's Gay Pride parade," Brachear noted in opening her 16-paragraph post. "Should gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender flocks have their own sanctuaries? Or does the concept of a LGBT congregation encourage an isolation within faith communities that defies the very purpose of assembling for worship?"

Brachear then went on to cite a Christian pastor and a Jewish rabbi to defend their gay-oriented congregations. Both cited the exodus of the Hebrews from Egypt in defense of their sexually-oriented ecclesiology.

Yet despite the Trib's insistence in her profile that "Chicago Tribune religion reporter Manya Brachear embodies the journalist’s quest for truth and the personal search for Truth--with a capital T," the so-called Seeker failed to consult religious conservatives among Jewish and Christian traditions in the Windy City who would rebuke the practice of homosexuality as incompatible with the teachings of those faiths.

"Has the non-negotiable stance and rhetoric against abortion rights strayed from the Scripture’s call to choose life and led to a grave disrespect for life even inside our houses of worship?"

So asks Chicago Tribune religion reporter/blogger Manya Brachear in a June 1 The Seeker blog post, headlined "Is abortion inevitable consequence of abortion debate?" It followed in the wake of the May 31 shooting of abortionist George Tiller. Tiller, an usher at Wichita's Reformation Lutheran Church, was shot during the Sunday service there.

"Has the quest to save lives robbed people of their humanity," Brachear asks in concluding her story. Nowhere in her article, however, did she look at the other side of the coin and wonder if the rhetoric of abortion rights activists leads inevitably to the moral legitimization of infanticide.

Surely Ms. Brachear is not unaware of Princeton University bioethicist Peter Singer, who believes it should be legal to kill disabled newborns. From a 2006 "You Ask the Questions"  interview in the British newspaper The Independent (questions are in bold):

One hundred forty-four years after his assassination, Chicago Tribune religion blogger Manya Brachear hacked out an 11-paragraph post on how "Lincoln's death had sacred significance," according to some historians and Lincoln biographers.

"Harold Holzer, co-chair of the U.S. Lincoln Bicentennial Commission, said the Good Friday assassination earned Lincoln a permanent place in American mythology," Brachear noted in her April 14 post, before quoting Holzer's argument at length.

But no Lincoln story in the mainstream media is complete without an Obama tie-in, and Brachear made sure to deliver, again quoting Holzer:

"So which is worse? Denying the Holocaust? Or condemning New Orleans?"

That's how Chicago Tribune religion blogger Manya Brachear began her Feb. 11 The Seeker blog post, practically considering the Pope to be another politician who must watch out for how his PR blunders affect his poll numbers (emphasis mine):

Shortly after Pope Benedict XVI quelled concerns last week regarding the excommunication of a Holocaust denier, he caused another stir closer to home. He reportedly tapped a bishop who once described Hurricane Katrina as God’s punishment for sin and debauchery in New Orleans.

According to the Times of London, Father Gerhard Maria Wagner, an ultraconservative parish priest at Windischgarsten in Austria, published his theory of divine retribution in his parish newsletter four years ago.

A group that "celebrate[s] the inherent goodness of adolescent sexuality" and calls for clergy to "speak out against... coercive parental notification and consent for reproductive health services" has just released a study that concludes by calling on American theological seminaries to go over the birds and bees with their students.

Yet in reporting on the study by the Religious Institute on Sexual Morality, Justice and Healing, Chicago Tribune's Manya Brachear failed to label the group as liberal or to find conservative theologians to dispute its arguments. [Click here for our archive on Brachear]

What's more, Brachear practically said "Amen" to the Institute's viewpoint in the opening lines of her January 8 "The Seeker" blog post:

Rev. Jeremiah Wright returned to the pulpit of Trinity United Church of Christ on Sunday, reports Manya Brachear of the Chicago Tribune. Will the networks notice that Wright suggested ABC and CNN were "the gates of Hell"? They might enjoy Wright suggesting Sean Hannity and Bill O’Reilly were Satan, but he also listed the Chicago newspapers and Time magazine. He also mocked Elizabeth Hasselbeck as factually challenged – even as he insisted that December 7 was the day the United States dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima instead of Pearl Harbor Day.

"Jesus said upon this rock I will build--listen to the promise--my church," he said. "And the gates of Hell--listen to the promise--the gates of Hell--neither ABC nor CNN--the gates of Hell--neither Hannity nor O'Reilly--the gates of Hell--neither Time, Time magazine, Chicago Sun Times, Chicago Tribune ... the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it. Nothing will be impossible with God."

"Does Palin have explaining to do," Chicago Tribune religion blogger Manya Brachear asked in her post-vice presidential debate blog post. Here's how Brachear opened her October 3 entry at her "The Seeker" blog:

Pentecostals have called on the mainstream media to stop mocking their sister Sarah Palin. But when will the Republican vice-presidential candidate answer the questions that swirl every time a new church video surfaces on YouTube? Was Thursday's prime time debate yet another missed opportunity?

By contrast, a review of Brachear's blog entries dealing with Sen. Obama's controversial former pastor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright, show Brachear did not have similar concerns with Obama's relationship with Wright. Indeed, back in June, Brachear asked, "Can a candidate worship in peace?" The Trib staffer was referring to the fact that Obama was leaving Trinity United Church of Christ, blaming media scrutiny for ruining the worship experience for himself and his fellow parishioners:

Reporting on a decision by LifeWay Christian Stores to not promote a magazine whose cover story lauded female pastors, Chicago Tribune religion reporter Manya Brachear stacked the deck against the Christian bookseller, failing to speak to a staffer there for an explanation of a policy decision on a magazine the stores carry on their shelves. Yet if she had done her homework, Brachear may have found ample reason that the book store may have had to suspect the editorial judgment and theological conviction of the magazine in question.

In her September 25 post, "Gospel magazine too risque for rack," Brachear found room to quote the publisher of Gospel Today magazine and a female pastor featured in its September/October 2008 issue. Brachear snarked that the decision by Lifeway to put the magazine behind the counter was much like what convenience stores do to racy magazines:

Rev. Kimberly Ray never thought she'd be on the cover of a magazine considered too risque for the racks. But this month, Ray , the head of Angie Ray Ministries and Church on the Rock in Matteson, joined four other female pastors on the cover of Gospel Today magazine.

Because the article broke Southern Baptist rules about women in the pulpit, Lifeway Christian Bookstores, a chain run by the Southern Baptist Convention, pulled its glossy pages from the shelves and tucked it behind the counter where 7-Elevens normally stash Playboy and Penthouse.

Chicago Tribune religion reporter and blogger Manya Brachear echoed a familiar liberal media meme about orthodox Christianity in her latest "The Seeker" blog post, "Have Southern Baptists lost their way?" (emphases mine):

As a number of conservative Protestant denominations now face decline, leaders have chosen to batten down the hatches, endorse orthodoxy and herald the importance of sharing their faith with others.

But if these denominations narrow their theology at the same time they widen their outreach, is anybody going to listen?

[...]

In her April 24 post at The Seeker blog, Chicago Tribune's Manya Brachear asked readers how they would keep the peace between Armenian and Greek Orthodox priests that maintain the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem. Brachear also noted the concern at least one reader of the Tribune expressed as to the grammatically, historically, and theologically sloppy way in which the print edition rendered a caption describing the church (emphasis mine):

Revered by most Christians as the site of the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus Christ, the sanctuary was built over the place where Jesus is said to have been buried.

It’s the latter description of the church that sparked a newsroom debate this week. Reader Marcia Smith Marzec of Joliet pointed out that a caption in the Tribune’s April 21 edition described the church as "built over the site in Jerusalem where Jesus is said to be buried."

"Even non-believers know that for Christians, Christ rose from the dead, and therefore is not ‘buried’ anywhere," Marzec wrote.

If you ask the average man on the street, regardless of his religion, he'd probably tell you that anyone who would disrupt an Easter Mass with a political protest -- complete with stage blood and attempted "die-in" -- is a jerk with little if any reverence for God or the sanctity of a church as a place of worship.

But according to the Chicago Tribune's Manya Brachear the so-called Catholic Schoolgirls Against the War are representative of a "frustrated faction" of Catholic faithful (emphasis mine):

Cardinal Francis George has long opposed politics at the communion rail. But Sunday’s anti-war protest at the start of his Easter homily spotlighted a frustrated faction in the Roman Catholic church who believe committed Catholics must do more than preach and pray for peace.

Yesterday my colleague Noel Sheppard noted that some Anglican bishops are urging their flocks to go "carbon" free during Lent. Along the same eco-insanity line, Chicago Tribune's religion blogger Manya Brachear submitted a post on Tuesday wondering if there's a "moral obligation" that Catholic priests have to urge their parishioners to go "fishless" or vegetarian on Fridays given concerns about mercury contamination:

Roman Catholic bishops once urged parishioners to observe meatless Fridays as a year-round act of penance. Since Vatican II, bishops have upheld meatless Fridays only during Lent, the 40 days leading up to Easter. The only exception is fish, prompting an annual run on seafood markets and a slew of fish fries in place of church potlucks.

But the dangers of eating tuna and swordfish, which scientists say is loaded with mercury, might be more flagellation than bishops had in mind. With Lent beginning Wednesday, should clergy encourage their flock to give up certain kinds of fish or go vegetarian?

[...]

"Should all have been forgiven or does the teacher's sentence send a fair message that foreigners sholud [sic] be more sensitive when it comes to religion?"

Thus concludes Manya Brachear's November 29 post to the Chicago Tribune's "The Seeker" religion news blog. Brachear was opening discussion up in her comments thread to the case of British subject Gillian Gibbons, a 54-year-old private school teacher in Sudan who faced the potential punishment of 40 lashes. Her crime: allowing her students to name a class teddy bear Muhammad.

The case had sparked international outrage and official protest by the British government. Perhaps in no small part from all the scrutiny, the Islamic clerics who have sentenced Ms. Gibbons handed down a relatively "light" sentence: 15 days in jail followed by deportation back to the United Kingdom.

Perhaps hoping to evince detached balance and objectivity, the Tribune's Brachear, a religion reporter and blogger, entitled her blog post, "Who's Insulting Islam?"

While Brachear did find moderate Muslims who decried charges ever having been filed against Gibbons in the first place, she failed to find anyone to insist that Sudan's government, or at least its judicial system, is held sway by a backwards, intolerant, theocratic imposition of Sharia law. What's more, Brachear found space to hint that the British government may be to blame for nearly causing Gibbons to face the lash:

What's your nomination for today's Dumb Headline of the Day?

Here's mine, from the August 27 blog entry by Chicago Tribune religion reporter/blogger Manya Brachear. The topic was Mother Teresa's diary and how some entries revealed a fear of being distant from Jesus:

"Can saints have bad days?"

Don't get me wrong. I like that mainstream media do take some efforts to report more religion and faith news items these days, including blogs like "The Seeker" at Chicago Tribune's home on the Web and the ongoing "On Faith" feature hosted by the Washington Post and Newsweek.

But just as I ripped "On Faith" for asking if good works were preferable to being saved, I have to admit this August 6 discussion starter by the Trib's Manya Brachear is a little clumsy as well:

Is church the right venue to talk about pornography? Is a small dose really that wrong?

This from the same blogger who asked, "Does sex bring you closer to God?"

On the heels of an earth-shattering exploration of the 237 reasons people have sex --I swear, someone's going to make this into a coffee table book and get rich off of it -- Chicago Tribune faith and religion blogger Manya Brachear wondered, "Can sex bring you closer to God?"

Brachear opened her August 1 "The Seeker" blog entry:

Why do so many people of faith seem obsessed with sex? Or it just the people who cover them?

Although Brachear tossed out the possibility that it's the media that are sex-obsessed, she quickly turned her attention to just how prudish she thinks America's numerous faith traditions are: