Q&A: Gustav Niebuhr Pushing the Opium of the Mass Media Context:
A longer version of this interview can be found on our website:
www.wweek.com. By Rachel Graham rgraham@wweek.com If there
is one great unexplored topic in mainstream media, itÕs religion.
And, if there is an American dynasty in the field of religion,
Gustav Niebuhr is its heir. So itÕs fitting that heÕs trying
to bridge that gapÑthough he waded into the breach somewhat
reluctantly.
NiebuhrÕs great-grandfather was a minister; his father
just retired from Harvard Divinity School. But the Niebuhr
name is most associated with his great-uncle and grandfather,
Reinhold and H. Richard Niebuhr, two ethics professors who
are perhaps the most influential mid-century American theologians.
Gustav Niebuhr, 44, is no slouch himself. After covering
politics in Louisiana, he switched to the religion beat
at the Atlanta Journal-Constitution and went on to the The
Wall Street Journal and the Washington Post. In 1994, he
signed on with The New York Times. Niebuhr is generally
considered the most prominent American journalist covering
religion today.
Never having planned to write about religion, Niebuhr
now represents the fourth generation of his family to examine
the interaction of faith and popular cultureÑand to attempt
to make each comprehensible to the other.
Niebuhr was in Portland Dec. 3 and 4 for Ecumenical Ministries
of OregonÕs annual Collins Lecture series. He talked with
Rachel Graham about the media, his family and the recent
controversy over Mark KroekerÕs statements.
Willamette Week: Religion is something the vast majority
of Americans Ôdo,Õ yet the media give less coverage to religion
than the National Hockey League. Only one TV network and
50-75 papers, out of 1,500 nationwide, cover the topic.
Why is that?
Gustav Niebuhr: I'm going to paraphrase something a reader
told me when I was at the Washington Post: Religion doesn't
fit in the standard news paradigm as politics and sports
and business do. In those three areas, there is a score
at the end of the day. You can add it up and say itÕs finished
and begin again the next day. In religion, you don't have
that sort of neatness. If you want to go back a little further,
there's not much taught about religion in journalism school.
Study after study shows a gap between journalists,
who tend to be much more liberal and, if not atheistic,
then at least more a-religious, than the nation as a whole.
I've heard that statistic, and based on experience I don't
completely buy it. I've covered religion for 15 years, and
one of the unsolicited parts of my job is to hear about
peopleÕs religious beliefsÑsomething that usually wouldn't
come up. I hear lots about peopleÕs inner lives, and I don't
think people in the media are as secular as they are made
out to be.
So why is religion, especially institutional religion,
often covered with what seems to me a lot more trepidation
than other subjects?
Editors probably have felt burned because if you make
a serious mistakeÑor even a little oneÑin religion, you
will get a reaction. That's no reason not to cover something,
but it can give pause. I also think religion often suffers
from a lack of imagination, in terms of coverage. There's
a perception that it exists in a box: People go to church
an hour on Sunday or Friday nights and then they go away
and do other things. Religion shapes peopleÕs thinking,
but I think it's very hard for some editors and reporters
to conceive of that, in part because there was a traditional
way to cover religion as a Sunday eventÑthe Sunday sermon
column. The Times had one as late as the 1960s. For me,
religion is so conducive to coming up with ideas. One of
the wonderful things about the religion beat is that there
really are no limits.
You didn't start out as a religion reporter. Were
you intentionally not going into the family business?
Religion wasn't my goal. I started out with a decision
to be a political reporter. About five years into it, I
got a call from a friend who told me the Atlanta Journal-Constitution
was starting a religion beatÑthat is, not the church page
but a freestanding beat. I knew that was exactly what I
wanted to do. I had never thought of [covering religion]
before. I lobbied hard for the job.
Do you feel there's a connection between your work
and that of your father, great-uncle and grandfather?
Yes, but I feel I'm doing it my own way. I'm contributing
something that's somewhat similar but different. At its
best, what I do is work within a clearly secular institution
to explain the religious aspect of society both to people
who have nothing to do with it and to those who do. Yesterday
I was talking with the man succeeding Desmond Tutu as Archbishop
of Cape Town. The Times' photographer, who takes all kinds
of pictures but shoots mainly politicians, said he really
enjoyed listening to our discussion. That was gratifying
to hear. Religion is provocative, fresh. I get to ask deep
questions, which a lot of people in journalism don't get
to hear. You can find a million people in journalism to
talk about dimpled chads, but we were talking about religious
perspectives on apartheid and international debt relief.
What sort of reactions do you get when you tell people
you are a religion reporter?
Some people think itÕs so interesting, and some can't
understand at all.
Do people often ask you about your religious affiliation?
It's never a pleasant experience, but I do get it. Especially
in casual conversations. ÔAre you religious?Õ is like being
asked, ÔAre you patriotic?Õ It means, ÔAre you religious
by my standards?Õ I'm not sure what people mean by it, and
some people mean something really negative. I find myself
really thrown. I tell people, ÔIf you want me to answer
the question, you have to explain what you mean by it,Õ
and that usually takes care of that. Much more frequently,
people actually explain themselves to me, and I never ask
people I'm not interviewing. I say what I do and then they
say, ÔI'm not religiousÕ followed by Ôbut...,Õ and you find
out they are dealing with questions of meaning. People are
not really hesitant about asking personal questions. By
and large, people whom I interview recognize we're in a
professional situation, I've come to talk to them about
them.
Do you worry about being pigeon-holed as "just" a
religion reporter?
Yes. We all have to think about that. I've been in print
media for 20 years and nearly 15 covering religion. I don't
know about the future. Religion is something that remains
so interesting, which helps keep it going for me. I think
if I were covering elections year in, year out, I would
get bored.
How much does the public have the right to know about
public figuresÕ religious beliefs?
Well, Bradley tested that in the presidential primaries
when he wouldn't talk about his religious convictions. On
the one hand you have to respect that, but on the other
he really called attention to the issue. He was running
in a situation in which lots of people were talking about
religion. It's OK to ask the question, but up to them whether
they want to talk about it.
Here in Portland weÕve got a police chief who drew
fire over some comments he made about gays, women and parenting
at a Christian gathering.
I've heard about it but don't really know about it. The
question really seems to be: Are public figures entitled
to personal beliefs at odds with what society considers
to be important? I think it depends on how those beliefs
inform social and political actions.
There have been some complaints from conservatives
of a public double standardÑthat they are attacked for bringing
religion into politics but liberals get a green light to
talk about liberation theology.
Well, Lieberman drew a backlash of sorts for talking so
much about religion. I think conservative religion gets
a lot of coverage, not all of it negative. People are entitled
to complain if they feel they've been wronged, but I don't
think the coverage has been negative. I just don't see it.
What do you see as the future trends of religion in
America?
The most important development in current American religious
life is the increasing visibility of smaller religious groups
and pluralism. There are more players at the table who represent
important and historic long-term, religious faith groups.
One very interesting thing about the election which was
lost was the effort on the part of American Muslims to make
themselves heard, to endorse a candidate. A coalition of
Islamic organizations got together and endorsed George Bush.
That's saying something: "We're here, and we count." The
presence of religious diversity isn't an academic subject;
it poses theological challenges. How does one as a believer
relate to other believers from different faiths one isn't
familiar with?
Has covering religion made you reevaluate your own
beliefs?
One part of the job I enjoy is hearing about people's
religious experiences. It's one added benefit, because I'm
interested in how people have dealt with some of the great
questions of belief and meaning. In my conversation yesterday
with Archbishop Ndugane, he spoke about having a religious
conversion experience on Robbin Island, where he was imprisoned
as a very young man (and before Mandela). He said he went
through a period that was so awful; he came from a religious
family, and he was wrestling with Ôhow could a good god
allow this to happen?Õ He said he suddenly felt a tremendous
inner peace, he felt that God was with him, and that settled
the question. It was moving to hear that important dimension
of that man. Probably the most famous example is Martin
Luther King, who used to tell reporters how very early on
in Montgomery when he was a young manÑonly 26Ñhis house
was bombed. He sat down and prayed at the kitchen table
and felt God was with him to stay with the civil-rights
movement. That experience was fundamental; it changed his
life. Sure, he could talk about constitutional rights, which
certainly contributed, but that moment of crisis explained
why he was in the position he was in. One of the joys of
the religion beat is to hear people as individuals.
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