Purity Is Most Important!

Americas’ TV news broadcasts ignore conservative and Christian news events, except when coverage makes religious leaders look “cold, intolerant and oppressive,” says Washington, D.C.’s Media Research Center.

Though most Americans believe in God and regularly attend religious services, “religion and religious issues are hardly ever mentioned, much less covered, on network television morning, evening and magazine shows,” said the center’s chairman Brent Bozell. He said that the center has surveyed more than 18,000 nightly news shows broadcast by ABC, CBS, NBC, the Cable News Network and the Public Broadcasting Service, but found only 212 stories that focused on religion. That amounts to 1 percent of coverage although 52 percent of Americans say they attend church and more than 90 percent say that they pray regularly.

Network coverage of abortion and homosexuality “are never done from the religious viewpoint,” Bozell said. Instead, “religious figures are regularly portrayed as reactionary roadblocks while their positive influences are rarely covered.” Except at Christmastime, when the networks traditionally broadcast “heartwarming” segments in their broadcasts, the news shows usually portray religious groups and their leaders “as cold, intolerant and oppressive,” Bozell said.